Special thanks to Dietmar Thomas, Manager Brand & Integrated Communications OLED, from Philips Lumiblade for writting the following blog post.

Hamburg is one of Germany’s busiest and most attractive cities. Its port – one of the largest in Europe – sees container ships and cruise ships coming on an hourly basis. But Hamburg is also well known for its night life. Now, the city has a new venue for musical theater: the “Theater an der Elbe” (Editor’s note: German for “Theater at the river Elbe”, the river passing through Hamburg). It is located in a prime port location right next to the theater, which for years now has been attracting millions of viewers to the “The Lion King”.

The new “Theater an der Elbe” is located near the river Elbe in Hamburg, Germany.  (All Photos Credit of Stage Entertainment)

The new building also offers visitors something special including highly modern architecture, a generous foyer with an open gallery, glass facades and appealing bar areas. In November last year the new venue was inaugurated with the world premiere of the musical “The Miracle of Bern”. Developer and operator of the venue Stage Entertainmentcommissioned Philips with the entire light installation. This means that the visitors’ light experience begins right at the entrance where the lobby leads them over Luminous Carpets, carpets with LED lights woven into them. Here, they are welcomed by the highlight: a light installation by Dutch artist and designer Hugo Timmermanns which covers the entire central wall. His installation, consisting of 500 OLEDs, once again confirms the reputation of this leading light artist.

Timmermanns experiments with dynamic light patterns and seeks to fascinate the visitors with ever new variations on the theme of light in darkness. He creates a feel-good atmosphere with the pleasant light characteristics of the OLEDs which also animates the conversation among the guests. The Brite FL300, the latest and brightest OLED produced byLumiblade, is made use of here. Only these OLEDs, built into lamps in the shape of a pyramid, make the light patterns envisaged by Timmermans possible. Through an ingenious process, these light patterns were taken from the film “The Miracle of Bern”, which the musical is based on, and transferred onto the 500 OLEDs. Indeed, from a distance you seem to be able to make out the actors’ faces.

In addition to the OLEDs, Stage Entertainment makes its audiences’ eyes light up with cutting edge lighting technology on stage and in the auditorium. All LED lights in use are computer programmed using only a fifth of the energy that was previously needed in such contexts. The interlinked “Power over Ethernet” lighting concept is not only used to control the lighting but also provides the power.

Stage Entertainment is delighted with the harmonious overall lighting concept in the “Theater an der Elbe”, which is why it has now contracted Philips to equip the Lion King venue with new lighting technology as well. And OLED will play a role there again thanks to their natural quality and beauty of their light.