Project Team

design: Blackmilk Interiors
av: Audio and Lighting Services

Suppliers

statues: Cromwell Australia
artwork: Mcarb & Mcarb
carpet: RC&D, Signature Floorcoverings
furniture: Pegar International, Mulbury, Botton + Gardiner, Baresque
lighting: Italstyle Lighting Design

Ms Collins is the new inhabitant of the grand sandstone building on the corner of Melbourne’s Collins and Market streets, which in its previous incarnation had been home to Silk Road.

The latest venture for established hospitality group Roar Projects, which also owns Alumbra in the Docklands, Ms Collins includes seven bars all of varying sizes and ambience is capable of holding 800 patrons. It’s a vast black, multi-level structure daubed with a riot of pink and white paint and neon lighting, with intimate spaces tucked in every corner.

Designed by Blackmilk Interiors and inspired by French socialite ‘Ms Collins’, the elaborate venue evokes glamour and sexiness with the use of bold, opulent colours and a luminous material palette featuring high tech fabrics that are capable of changing colour with light.

VIP Room custom carpet

Designed by Blackmilk Interiors and manufactured by RC&D. Ege carpet Highline 910/100% nylon

RC&D


As well as thought provoking signage and daring use of colour, the venue features a suspended DJ stage that hovers above the central island bar. Pivotal to the design is the translucent central bar, framed with black steel and glass balustrades.

The interior was to present like a classical mansion that had been overrun by youth and undergone a transition to being an underground playground for Melbourne’s evolving club scene.

The former AMP building built in 1929 has historical significance that was not over thrown. In the various treatments of the space, the buildings’ history plays a role in the grandeur that has been created.

The inspiration for the graffiti based artwork derives its influence from a style icon Iris Apfel who is out interpretation of ‘Miss Collins’. In addition, the alter ego of ‘Miss Collins’ is interpreted through the world famous sixty year old DJ Ruth Flowers. Throughout the venue, both of these famous women have been immortalized into the artwork and graphic features.

The objective of the design was to create smaller, intimate and more exclusive spaces for VIP guests as well as meeting the demands for a bar/ nightclub environment. Patrons can enjoy a stimulating visual experience with plenty of playful innuendos created by street artist Juan McCarb.

There are high expectations in the fickle Melbourne club scene and these expectations are met with high level detail in the visual experience.

The intent of the design for the venue has been to drastically transform an existing establishment and create a whole new look whilst maintaining much of the building fabric and also revelling in its historical style.

The design innovation is clear when the result clearly demonstrates the ability to bring together three forms of art; fashion, music and design. All of this has been achieved by celebrating the skills of the artists and designers involved with the project in a collaborative approach.

Ms Collins takes over from the old Silk Road Bar/Nightclub, the clients requirements were to re-developed in a cost effective manner and create a new iconic address in the Melbourne CBD. Due to the historical site limitations, much of the existing building fabric had to be retained.

The six month project had a budget of 1.5 million.

Audio and Lighting Services were tasked to design, supply and install the lighting and audio requirements of the venue.

Audio
Processing: QSC Audio Core 250i controlled via a TCS-3 (touch screen controller) fixed into various locations in the venue and a iPad for wireless access. This allows any source of input to be routed to any output in the venue by simply clicking a button.

Amplification: QSC Audio PLD4.5 There are 40 channels of amplification at 2000 Watts of power per channel that have been installed to power every speaker in the venue. All amplifiers have on board DSP (Digital Signal Processing) to allow the flexibility that we require to tune and control the sound system.

Speakers:
The main room and Mezzanine floor:
. 4 x Martin Audio LE 2100S (three-way bi-amp, high powered speaker for the dance floor)
. 4 x Martin Audio F8+ (Room Fills)
. 4 x Martin Audio WS218X (18″ high powered sub)
. 6 x Martin Audio XD12 (two-way bi-amp, high powered speaker)
In the DJ Booth the DJ Monitors used are:
. 2 x Martin Audio XD15 (two-way bi-amp, high powered speaker)
. 1 x Martin Audio S18+ (18″ high powered sub)
the Ballroom:
. 4 x Martin Audio XD12 (two-way bi-amp, high powered speaker)
. 1 x Martin Audio WS218X (18″ high powered sub)
. 1 x Martin Audio DX12 DJ Monitor
the Champagne Bar:
. 2 x Martin Audio XD12 (two-way bi-amp, high powered speaker)
. 2 x Martin Audio S12+ (12″ sub)
the Barber Shop:
. 2 x Martin Audio F10+

DJ Gear:
the main room (the DJ Booth)
. 4 x Pioneer CDJ-2000 Nexus (CD Players)
. 1 x Pioneer DJM-900 Nexus (Mixer)
. 1 x Pioneer RMX-500 (Effects Unit)
the Ballroom:
. 2 x Pioneer CDJ-2000 Nexus (CD Players)
. 1 x Pioneer DJM-900 Nexus (Mixer)
. 1 x Pioneer RMX-500 (Effects Unit)
the Champagne Bar:
. 2 x Pioneer CDJ-2000 Nexus (CD Players)
. 1 x Pioneer DJM-900 Nexus (Mixer)

Lighting
The main entrance is high and features a large white horse hanging upside down. This is lit up at night by three Pro Shop LED Quad Bars with the colourful display acting as a beacon to passing pedestrians and traffic. An ELC DMX Scene player controller looks after this area.
For the main room and the mezzanine floor, Louie took the opportunity to use some of Martin’s RUSH fixtures with sixteen RUSH MH3 beam lights and six RUSH MH1 profile lights. Added to that were six MAC Auras.

“The venue trades three nights per week in nightclub mode so we needed a product that would last and reliability was a big factor when choosing the fixtures,” commented Louie. “The beams from the RUSH MH3 are fantastic – bright and quick. The MAC Auras were chosen to provide colour wash in the room but as they can zoom we also use them to highlight things such as dancers. They’ve been performing great.”

Adam Leelasorn is the inhouse technician at Ms Collins and he has been blown away by the Martin RUSH fixtures.

“The MH3’s are brilliant, such a strong beam … I love them!” he said. “It’s really interesting using them to make shapes and patterns in the air, they’re wonderfully powerful and pretty quick too. They do most of the work through the void in the main bar area. The MH1 profile lights are pretty cool too especially the gobo selection in the gobo wheel.

“The MAC Auras are great for lighting the room when it trades as just a bar rather than a nightclub. However, when the room is in nightclub mode I have a lot of fun with the Auras going from a sharp beam out to a wider focus using different colours.”

As Louie already has a splendidly performing Martin M1 console in sister venue Alumbra, he decided to stick with the same platform.

“It’s a great console, never misses a beat and is easy to use,” he added. ““The M1 is the complete package: simple to learn, I like the touchscreen and the colour picker window for easy colour selection is great too. We also added a Martin Ether 2DMX8 for Artnet to DMX conversion.”

In the near future the venue plans to install LED screens and in preparation, Louie has supplied them with a coolux Pandoras Box Media Server to play video content on the LED Screen.

Pro Shop RGB HD LED Tape

The Pro Shop RGB HD LED Tape is by far the easiest way to provide a colour changing touch to pelmets, undersides of furniture edges, in fact anywhere you have limited space and wish to create a bright and saturated glow.

Show Technology

The Ballroom area of the venue has six RUSH MH2 wash lights which are, according to Louie, compact yet powerful, fast and agile. Their unique wash beam effects are possible with auto trig shows and music trig sound activation.

“Unfortunately the Ballroom often runs with a separate DJ and I have to leave the MH2’s with a few programmed looks,” lamented Adam. “I’m very tempted to move them into the main room so I can get my hands on them as they’re a great fixture!”

Ninety-six of the new Elation Pixel Bar 40 Modular Linear RGB Pixel Control LED Strips are on the roof with another coolux Pandoras Box Media Server supplied, this time for pixel mapping the LED strips. The Pixel Bars are great for displaying imagery or can be used as a wash luminaire for floodlighting surfaces and stages. They are an exciting addition to the venue and there energetic displays have become quite a talking point.

“They really look beautiful and are one of the best looking features of the venue,” remarked Adam.

Martin Audio XD12

The XD12 is a high-power, high-output, two-way system equally suited to portable live sound applications, theatre and fixed installations. It features a high-specification 12” (300mm) low frequency drive unit and a 1” (25mm) exit compression driver mounted on a user-rotatable 80° x 50° constant directivity horn.

TAG


All five bars in the venue are internally lit up with Pro Shop RGB HD LED Tape with each controlled via their own ELC DMX Scene player.

“This is really useful for when corporate clients hire the venue and so they can light up the bar in the appropriate corporate colour,” said Louie. “The Pro Shop RGB LED Tape is a simple way to provide a colour changing touch to a bar creating a bright and saturated glow. The output is even and vibrant and the colours achievable are endless.”

The Pro Shop RGB HD LED Tape is so effective Adam has to turn down the brightness.

“If I had them turned up to 100% I could pretty much light the entire venue with them,” he laughed. “I have to turn them down quite a bit for the club mode but during the day trade I run them quite bright.”

Atmosphere throughout the venue is supplied by Martin Jem Compact Hazer Pro machines.