Worship AVL Wooridle Church Special Report

Worship AVL’s Richard Lawn writes: 

Judging from the exterior the six-storey magnificence of Wooridle Church in the Pangyo district of Yongin City, it’s hard to imagine that its origins can be traced to a gymnasium of Seoul’s Hwimoon High School. As is the case with so many churches in South Korea, the church rapidly grew in numbers to the point that its membership now stands at almost 6,000 worshippers.

Seating approximately 2,500 people at any one time, the sanctuary comprises a large stage overlooked by an expansive balcony with ground-floor seating beneath. While coinciding with the building’s 10th anniversary in 2014, a major refurbishment of the 2,500-capacity sanctuary included the addition of some 400 new LED house lights. However, with the subsequent arrival of new LED dimming models becoming available on the market, the church’s lighting designers went back to school. Hansam Systems sales manager Kim Tay Han was more than happy to provide an overview of a new generation of LED dimmers offering improved lighting consistency and a significant cost-saving over time.

Following a proposal provided by Hansam Systems, the Wooridle Church committee nominated the distributor and systems integrator a contract to upgrade the lighting dimmer fixtures throughout the fourth-level, auditorium-style sanctuary. ‘We are incredibly proud to have worked on the Wooridle project. It is the first major house of worship installation in South Korea with a complete Global Design Solutions (GDS) LED upgrade and the end results are stunning,’ explained GDS Korea COO, Jinhee Park. ‘GDS Korea was called upon to provide lighting enclosures that would serve as a retrofit for the existing design. On meeting with the church, we were able to demonstrate the great cost and energy savings with an LED upgrade. Moving away from tungsten, the church is now illuminated with dimmable and better-quality light.’

Over a two-week period, more than 300 Fidelity Series 2K and 4K LED downlights were installed into the existing LED fixtures from overhead catwalks. Providing smooth and uniform 100–0% dimming with Wooridle project. It is the first major house of worship installation in South Korea with a complete Global Design Solutions (GDS) LED upgrade and the end results are stunning,’ explained GDS Korea COO, Jinhee Park. ‘GDS Korea was called upon to provide lighting enclosures that would serve as a retrofit for the existing design. On meeting with the church, we were able to demonstrate the great cost and energy savings with an LED upgrade. Moving away from tungsten, the church is now illuminated with dimmable and better-quality light.’
Over a two-week period, more than 300 Fidelity Series 2K and 4K LED auditorium downlights were installed into the existing LED fixtures from overhead catwalks. Providing smooth and uniform 100–0% dimming with RDM remote dimming management functions such as DMX addressing, dimmer curve selection and PWM frequency change. In the case of Wooridle, uniform dimming of the downlights is conducted from the control surface of the Prodigy Series DMX controller connected to a combi and fader module.

‘As is normal with houses of worship, Hansam Systems had to fit around a busy church schedule,’ explains GDS Korea’s APAC Business Development Manager, Bill Price. ‘Therefore, none of the works could be carried out during the weekends or during Wednesday services. With Device Management integrated into the drivers, however, all the fittings could be addressed remotely, saving the engineers valuable time on site. The church lighting team was initially enticed by the compact nature of the LED downlights as they suit a recessed installation for short-throw illumination.’

Following an initiative taken by GDS co-founder Richard Cuthbert, GDS Korea was established in 2017 to better cater to the growing market in the country. Manufactured in South Korea in order to minimise production costs, the GDS Fidelity Series has marked its arrival at Wooridle to signal the onset of more dramatic entrances for churchgoers within and beyond Seoul. ‘Our Fidelity Series was specifically developed for auditorium lighting applications such as Wooridle,’ explains Park. ‘Each of the 2K and 4K downlights consumes just 22W and 55W of power and so the church is now enjoying a healthy ROI with such cost-savings.’

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