Helsinki City Theatre Chooses Clear-Com For Renovation Project

The Helsinki City Theatre in Finland has installed an extensive and fully integrated wired and wireless system from Clear-Com as part of a multi-million Euro renovation project.

The system was designed and installed by Clear-Com and its partner Noretron, working with the British consultant Theatreplan, within a challenging time frame to fit with construction work and the closed theatre season.

Helsinki City Theatre is a modern building which originally opened in 1967, with an annexe that was added in 1989. The renovation provides a comprehensive modernisation of aspects including stage equipment, accessibility and facilities for the public, performers and staff, as well as the restoration of many original features of the building.

A significant proportion of the renovation budget was allocated for state-of-the-art equipment, including a new theatre-wide communication system. The theatre houses three separate stages: the Big Stage (947 seats), the Small Stage (200-400 seats) and the Studio Elsa (140-200 seats). With coverage requirements exceeding 150m and across seven floors, it was critical to ensure that every area in the house benefited from good quality audio with no drop-outs.

Early in the design stage, the Theatreplan consultant, Mathew Smethurst-Evans, suggested Clear-Coms’s FreeSpeak II wireless system to the client. During evaluation it was proved to have excellent coverage and audio quality in every area of the house.

In order to ensure the highest degree of integration across the wired and wireless communications solution, the site-wide system was designed using all-Clear-Com products. The system is a large, integrated installation of Eclipse HX digital matrix platform supported by the EHX Configuration Software, 22 x V-Series Rotary Panels, 4 x Agent-IC Mobile Panels, 40 x integrated FreeSpeak II wireless beltpacks in 1.9GHz and a large number of new CC110 and CC220 headsets.

The complete system is now installed across the seven floors of the building including areas such as offices, studios and make-up rooms.

Antti Rehtijärvi, Technical Director, HCT, said:"With tight timescales for commissioning and installation, I had every confidence working with the technical support team at Clear-Com."

The theatre will re-open in August 2017, presenting the play Maija, The Daughter of the Stormy Island.