Not to be confused with the Australian rock band of the same name, the new $58 Million winter sports facility Icehouse, located at Melbourne’s Waterfront City precinct in the Docklands, is one of the more impressive pieces of infrastructure built in this city for a very long time.
Proudly billed as the largest winter sport facility in the southern hemisphere, the Icehouse features two full-sized ice rinks suitable for ice hockey, curling, short-track speed skating, figure skating, and recreational skating. Rink 1 (the main competition rink, complete with stadium seating) is named the Henke Rink after the Chairman of the Olympic Winter Institute, Geoff Henke. Rink 2 is named the Bradbury Rink, after our most stand-up Winter Olympian of all time, Stephen Bradbury.
Despite the excellent professional facilities available, the venue is more than a training facility for elite athletes. The Bradbury Rink is designed as a family friendly entertainment rink, with ‘general skating’ already proving to be very popular. The rink has been ‘pimped out’ with a striking Audio Visual design by Massteknik, including a JBL sound system and a light show that would not look out of place at a major city nightclub. Both rinks also have massive LED screens at the end of them, with the Rink 1 screen being used as a scoreboard for Ice-Hockey, while the 8m wide screen above rink 2 is perfect for showing music video clips that add to the party vibe of the rink.
Lightmoves supplied the feature lighting for the Bradbury Rink, partnering with Massteknik for the design and installation. Sixteen Martin smartMAC’s provide the bulk of the amazing and dynamic colour seen on the ice, while LED pinspots and LED Par 64’s provide wonderful colour-changing wash and compliment the eight mirror balls. The unique fanless cooling system of the smartMAC’s and the extended lamp life and low power usage of the LED’s, contribute to keeping this venue very sustainable. The Lighting is all controlled by a GrandMA OnPC, located in the upstairs AV control room, which can also interface with the building’s Crestron lighting control and Medialon show control systems. This allows for simple control of programmed lighting scenes via ground level DJ’s or Rink staff from a portable Touchscreen . The Lightmoves-supplied goal lights on Rink 1’s Ice-Hockey goals are controlled via Philips Dynalite and driven by Crestron.
Lightmoves also supplied the custom-designed Browns Truss that houses the lighting rig. Two straight sections per side complement a large central cross-truss to provide
After being a somewhat of a Great Southern Wasteland for winter sports for many years, Melbourne – and Australia for that matter – can look forward to seeing a tremendous growth in winter sports over the next decade, thanks to this professional, practical and attractive new venue.
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