MSL have been working with Franck Lumbar, owner and operator of Club Vanilla in Windsor for 3 years, in addition to a number other venues in Lumbar’s portfolio including Club Essence in Kingston and the Pink Gentleman’s club in Windsor.

Club Vanilla has been operating from its subterranean site in Windsor for a number of years before MSL were called in to overhaul the venue’s lighting and audio system.

Following a busy Christmas and New Year trading period, the venue closed its doors for a complete building, audio and lighting transformation, seeing the club’s spaces opened up to create more space and provide new VIP booth seating areas, a new live sound stage and members bar area.

Project Manager Bradley Watson was entrusted to re-design the existing audio infrastructure, utilising the venues armoury of Martin Audio full range Blackline F15 (15” + 1”) F12 (12” + 1”) and F10 (10” + 1”) enclosures, and a quantity of the high power S218+ (2 x 18” sub bass) With the new dance floor space growing in size, the F15 enclosures have been moved to the main bar area, being replaced by a quad array of high power Martin Audio H3+ horizontal enclosures, with the low frequency extension being supplied by a pair of the British manufacturer’s legendary 8.5kW ASX 21” powered active sub bass enclosures.

A brand new BSS Soundweb London audio management system has been selected for the front end user interface at Club Vanilla, allowing the operators to seamlessly switch between the “DJ” and “Live Sound” inputs. MSL head engineer Toby Jones has again designed a comprehensive sound file to allow for the varying applications within the Windsor club, offering a “one touch” solution for the venue staff.

To match the new high specification audio system, existing lighting effects were utilised with 8 new Martin Professional MAC 250 Krypton moving head luminaires. The high end fixtures were deployed above the main dance floor, in addition to the venues existing lighting effects. Working alongside the new automated fixtures is a JEM club smoke head system, providing a platform for a perfect lighting compliment to the high energy sound solution.

A new touch screen Showcad automated lighting control system was also supplied to manage the moving lighting, in addition to the large quantity of Pulsar LED high output architectural effect lighting throughout the Windsor site. Pulsar Chroma Deck panels were cleverly utilised in the new VIP booth areas, allowing for a colour changing “table tops” for the VIP guests., and over 100m of high output Pulsar X3 LED IP rated strip was also used to great effect behind the bar areas, throughout the entrance and in the guests bar area. 20 Pulsar Chroma Zone control packs and DMX buffers complete the lighting specification.

The newly redesigned venue is sure to attract the loyal following that the venue has built, and with the new sound system, layout and dedicated VIP and members areas is sure to rank highly within the Windsor late night venues of choice.