The first building on the site of the current church was a dual-purpose church and school room, officially opened in 1870. By 1882 a larger church had been built on the site that was widely admired for its lofty tower and Victorian Gothic features. However, when a Second World War V1 flying bomb fell directly opposite the church the blast rendered it unusable, until it was rebuilt in 1952. Now in 2022 the church has been given a makeover with a new sound system and internal and external lighting.
Sound System
Clarity proposed several modifications and additions to the church sound system to improve the features and flexibility of the equipment and greatly simplify the control for non-technical users. The design of the system has made it suitable for many uses, including services and external hires.
Clarity use professional products that have a proven track record for being durable and reliable and they believe in a ‘plug and play’ mentality to keep things simple and easy to use, and that can be enhanced with additional features when required. All connection points and volume controls are fully labelled so there is never any confusion.
Clarity recommended that the existing loudspeakers be replaced with high quality, discreet speech reinforcement line array loudspeakers that offer a unique combination of outstanding sound quality and slim form making them almost invisible, as shown in the photograph below.
With the modifications to the existing infrastructure the sound system can now be simply controlled by a wall-mounted volume control panel, or wirelessly via an iPad. The iPad screen layout was customised to the church’s requirements.
The new equipment installed included a limiter which protects the system from being over-driven, a suppressor to prevent feedback, automatic gain control for when there are different levels of speech or music, a mixer for separating zones, a noise compensator, multiple connection points, new amplifiers, subwoofers and control and input panels.
Internal and External Lighting
Clarity proposed an almost totally wireless new house lighting system, thus providing a far neater and near ‘invisible’ installation. The award-winning range of modular, highly efficient LED lighting installed in Putney Methodist Church is being used in venues all around the world including numerous theatres in London and elsewhere, the Royal Albert Hall and various churches and chapels, including the Tower of London chapel. These fixtures can be fitted into places of worship without the need to rewire providing mains power is available locally and meets the UK legal requirements. Different fixture ranges were chosen to perfectly suit the nave, aisles, ceiling beams and chancel.
Externally, colour changing battens were positioned at the bottom of each of the five main windows to highlight the architectural details. For the main tower two fixtures were positioned against the perimeter wall to illuminate both elevations. The stained-glass windows in the chancel have been lit externally for the benefit of the congregation inside, whilst the main entrance has two fixtures giving a wash diagonally across.
Contact us for further information on any of the products mentioned in this case study.
