Haven is an exclusive restaurant in the trendy South Beach district of Miami, Florida, featuring a fabulous Anolis LED lighting scheme created by lighting designer David Chesal and venue owner Mike Boles.
The 1237 Lincoln Road location is a contemporary food lounge mixing cutting-edge design, international cuisine and creative cocktails in South Beach’s busiest business district. Haven features a state-of-the-art light and sound installation that retains a warmth and accessibility that Boles believes will appeal to both locals and out-of-towners.
Different lighting scenes help to morph Haven from lunchtime lounging to early evening contemporary fusion dining to later evening dancing, chilling and cool DJ sets. Chesal and Boles took all these different mood parameters into account when considering how to light the venue.
The walls – effectively a massive HD projection window – can be streamed with one continuous digital image, ranging from breathtaking scenic views to abstract video art, evoking a constantly evolving environment which is also ideally suited to branding for private events.
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The lighting magic starts outside where Haven’s 20-seat sidewalk café offers cushioned teak arm chairs for open-air dining. Running alongside is a white concrete sidewalk. Embedded in the overhang above are Anolis ArcLine Outdoor Optic fixtures fitted with 25 x 6° lenses, giving the exact throw angle required to light the floor section below without spillage.
Once inside Haven, guests are welcomed by a black beach pebble water wall that leads into the 120-capacity venue. The water wall feature has the same Anolis ArcLine Optic fixtures grazing the textural black stone behind. “The stone is absolutely jet black, but the output of the ArcLine Optics is so intense that they do literally colour change black with absolutely no problem – and that’s really impressive,” comments Chesal.
The focal point of the intimate space is a custom-designed open kitchen and chef’s counter offering front-row seats to the inventive food preparation. Like the counter, the bars and tabletops are constructed out of white Siberian onyx and reclaimed American walnut. The main bar is opposite the kitchen and extends midway into the lounge, where recycled black-leather banquettes and Ottomans accompany up-lit low tables that illuminate the chef-designed glass plate ware.@page_break@
The two back-lit stone bar dies (faces) are internally lit with Anolis ArcLine Optic 4, an RGB warm white source. Above the bar a channel is carved out of the wooden ceiling to the exact dimensions of a strip of ArcLink with 25 x 6° lenses, which beams downwards to illuminate the area below.
Embedded in the floor are 14 Anolis ArcSource 3 in-ground RGB units with 25° lenses uplighting the cocktail tables. When the tables are removed and the area becomes a dancefloor, these same lights take on a new role as colour changing effects fixtures.
The ceiling cones and the liquor tiers behind the bar are lit with Anolis ArcLink 3s – a very flexible pliable unit – and above the DJ booth is a row of ArcLine Optics downlighting the decks.
No self respecting venue would be replete without some groovy lighting in the toilets, and Haven is no exception, with custom-recessed boxes scooped out of the ceiling, each fitted with powerful Anolis ArcSource 7 RGBs with 6° lenses. The light sources are imperceptible to the eye producing dramatic illusory pools of light from nowhere.
Additional touches include a ceiling grid of 1,000 colour changing frosted replica ice cubes used by Haven’s mixologists combined with 14 zones of soft LED downlighting and a walnut-tree structure with an illuminated canopy for additional warmth.
Chesal sums up: “Haven was one of these amazing projects with real scope to illustrate what’s achievable with good lighting, and how this can add to the whole visitor experience and boost its success, literally as a chameleon-style environment. It was seriously inspirational working with Mike on the project, and I am very proud of the results of his vision and imagination.”
