When Ontario Lottery and Gaming hired Eastern Construction Company Ltd. and architects Mackay Wong Strategic Design to build the new Slots at Ajax Downs facilities in Canada, designers at MICE worked with the architects to direct traffic flow of patrons from the lobby to the casino's gaming floor. This meant engineering and installing interactive LED light walls. Three areas of the casino follow this design theme: the front lobby kiosk as a welcoming structure, the rear lobby hallway for entry to the casino, and the upper wall of the actual gaming floor where lighting can set the mood during all hours of the day.
The LED lobby kiosk design required the glass seams to be unobstructed with metal edges or bead, so corners were created with mitered glass. The light box appears to hang from one side of a dry-stacked slate structure. The result is a stylized “7” in moving colors and patterns via Color Kinetics iColor Cove® NXT LEDs. MICE custom-built the structure to hold panels of glass that were UV-welded at the seams, providing the uninterrupted flow of light and movement.
Closer to the gaming floor is an entryway of curved, structural steel supporting 48"×48"×½" panels of custom-formed textured, laminated glass. These panels cover rows of 12" iColor Cove NXT LEDs, all linked by Cat-5 cables back to Color Kinetics PDS 150e power supplies, which, in turn, are controlled from the CK Light System Manager.
The challenge of this area was to suspend laminated, 150-lb. panels of glass from a steel structure while minimizing shadows and still maintaining ease of access for maintenance. The close proximity of the visitors as they enter the casino also had to be considered, as this feature starts at the floor curving up to 12' over the heads of visitors and extending 8' out from the wall. The metal substructure is mounted to the floor and tied into the open-web steel joist of the ceiling. Smaller, less-obtrusive hanging points hold fastening plates for the corners of the glass panels and are covered by a decorative domed cap. Custom millwork covers the ends and the top valance to prevent light leakage.
The gaming floor presented a different challenge in using the same LED components to change the mood and feeling for different hours of the day, season, or festivity. MICE created another light wall with a series of interconnected housings mounted to the wall from 9' to 15' above the finished floor, around one half of the facility spanning 184'. All glass panels butt together to provide a smooth, minimally seamed installation. These lights were programmed separately from the kiosk and hallway via the CK Light System Manager, programmable for specific light shows timed to a schedule for daily operations. The shows can be programmed offsite and forwarded for installation in the Light System Manager.
The team from MICE comprises Fraser Elliott, director of commercial and retail sales, with Brent Allen as project manager and Nick Anastas as production manager. TPL Lighting of Toronto TPL supplied the Color Kinetics iColor Cove NXT and the Light System Manager.