Amare

12-10-2021 / Live /

Amptec delivers complete AV solution at Amare. Opened in September 2021, the Amare in the Hague is the largest cultural complex in the Netherlands. Home to the Royal Conservatoire, Residentie Orkest Den Haag and Nederlands Dans Theater, the ultra-modern facility houses four main halls for a total capacity of 3,600 guests in addition to several public spaces, study areas, classrooms and rehearsal studios. Interestingly, each of the four halls has been built on its own foundation - a building within a building - to ensure that the sound vibrations remain contained and do not disturb the other halls. Additional acoustic treatment within each hall ensures an optimum audio experience.

Following a successful tender bid, Amptec delivered the AV systems across the entire building including an extensive building-wide AV network which connects seamlessly to the wider AV infrastructure. Amptec was responsible for the entire project from conception through to design, supply, integration, commissioning and ongoing maintenance.

Audio systems

Amptec installed d&b audio systems throughout: a Y-Series line array system was chosen for the 1300-capacity Danstheater (the theatre hall) with point source cabinets for the Amare Studio rehearsal room whilst V-Series was the choice for Amare's largest space, the Concert Hall (standing capacity of 2500 or 1500 seated) complete with ArrayProcessing. A V-Series point source solution was chosen for the more intimate Conservatory Hall. Four Avid S6L mixing consoles provide mixing and control functionality whilst three DAD AX32 matrix systems signal handle routing and AD/DA conversion.

"All systems were carefully designed to control sound dispersion as tightly as possible for minimal impact on the acoustics of each room and maximum intelligibility for each seat," explains Amptec's Sjoerd Terpstra, part of the live sales team in NL. "We installed a d&b R90 touchscreen in each of the main halls for easy fingertip control and operation of the sound system. We were also asked to make the loudspeaker installations as discreet as possible for minimum visual impact. Consequently, the concert hall sound system hangs from hoists in the roof so that it doesn't impinge on sight lines, and other elements are even integrated into the architecture where possible."

"All systems were carefully designed to control sound dispersion as tightly as possible for minimal impact on the acoustics of each room and maximum intelligibility for each seat."

AV network

Another major element of this project was the design and implementation of the building-wide AV network for intercom, monitoring and announcements as well as video distribution. "The network is crucial to Amare's operation as it also includes all of the Voice Alarm and safety elements," says Steven Aerts, Amptec's technical project manager for Amare. "We opted for a redundant star topology using nine Arista CCS-720XP switches on a 10GB backbone with fibre connections over RSTP, ensuring that the network is fast, reliable and future-proof. There is also the possibility to expand to a 25G backbone."

800 custom connection panels connect 350 rooms with 10GB bandwith available for the patching of audio, video and the AV network to nine central patch locations spread across different floors and users. A redundant Watchguard firewall was installed to control communication within the 24 VLANs used for routing, as well as to be able to communicate with the office network.

VPN access is used for monitoring and remote support. This creates a link with the office network for monitoring video streams from work positions, control of the PA, fault detection, etc. The remote firewall communicates with the firewall of the office network. Rules are configured on both sides that determine communication. Finally, a DXD-16 PTP clock from Brainstorm is configured as master clock.

"Amare was a vast project that required a huge amount of planning and careful coordination," continues Aerts. "We managed and delivered the complete AV solution from start to finish including conception and proof of concept, both on and off site; production (engineering, predesign and creating the engineering drawings); installation (resource planning, cabling, racks, custom mechanics, custom front panels, documentation); calibration and commissioning; training of technical personnel and other users; maintenance; coordination with electricians, contractors, mechanical structures and acoustic consultants.

"Amare was a vast project that required a huge amount of planning and careful coordination. We managed and delivered the complete AV solution from start to finish."

The result is a system that meets Amare's criteria of efficiency, durability, sustainability, future-proof design and easy maintenance."