The Gala Venue Seating System
Beyond its Exceptional Technical Performance,
a Highly Reliable System
A pioneer in the early 2000s in the multipurpose venue industry, Gala Systems has become a world leader in solutions that allow spaces to be entirely reconfigured. From the Teatro Campos Elíseos in Bilbao to the Melbourne Convention Centre, by way of the Capitol Theatre in Singapore and the just-opened Sao Paulo Theatre in Brazil, the Gala Venue® seating system has inspired architects and venue managers the world over. To date, twenty-three venues with capacity ranging from 125 to 2,045 seats have been equipped with the Gala Venue reconfiguration technology, for a total of 16,888 movable seats. Three projects underway in 2021, featuring a never-before-seen multipurpose hall of 3,572 seats in India, will soon increase that number to 22,910.
ADVANCED TECHNICAL PERFORMANCE
Through an innovative rotation solution, where seats may be deployed or stored under the floor, the Gala Venue seating system allows a hall to be transformed from a raked seating layout to a flat floor space with virtually endless sub-configurations in between. Such a versatile space lends itself to an efficient use of every square meter, the key to hosting a panoply of events with sound financial returns.
Click here to learn how the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts in San Antonio achieved greater financial sustainability with its flexible main hall.
For the audience, it is impossible to tell the difference between a traditional venue and a “transformable” Gala Venue. Suited to both modern and historic settings, it can accommodate conferences, symphonies, rock concerts, live theatre, banquets or dance performances equally well, with unsurpassed quality standards in terms of comfort sightlines and finishes. And as for how the conversion process takes place, the answer is simple: between 5 and 20 minutes at just the touch of a button!
Click here to hear what the engineering team at the River Rock Show Theatre in Richmond (Vancouver) has to say about the efficiency of the system.
FUNCTION, RELIABILITY AND LIFESPAN OVERVIEW
Key to motion in the Gala Venue seating system is the factory-tested Spiralift® – a compact and powerful lifting actuator designed to ensure continuous performance in stringent industrial environments, such as the assembly lines of major car manufacturers including Ferrari, General Motors, Renault, Kia, Tesla and others. The technology has therefore always scored highly in terms of function, reliability and lifespan, which largely explains why it is now found in more than 1,750 projects in 65 countries. As for its fully automated multipurpose venue application, reliability was designed into the system and extensively validated by both large-scale usage observations and relevant analysis of the transformation activities conducted in 18 Gala Venues (1).
Trouble-free operation
From the beginning and with currently more than 17,800 venue transformations (2),
- the Gala Venue seating system has invariably been found to work smoothly with practically no running costs and virtually no parts replaced (3);
- no show has ever been delayed or cancelled due to a technical problem, even in halls with high annual conversion rates.
Exemplary reliability
A review of the transformation activities conducted in 18 Gala Venues between 2001 and 2016 revealed that:
- an incident requiring corrective action should not occur more than once over a projected period of 30 years of use of the system;
- this low probability can be even further reduced by an annual maintenance check of the equipment; and
- high reliability is supported by continuous optimization of the system throughout the course of the various projects realized over the years.
Frequent and trouble-free usage of the Gala Venue seating system has been recorded for years at the Swiss Tech Convention Center, in Lausanne. Primarily dedicated to hosting scientific and academic events –conventions, seminars and conferences – but also showcasing the performing arts, its main hall of 2,300 seats typically undergoes 300 to 400 changeovers per year, according to Event Operations Manager Thierry Gabor. This means it often sees more than one reconfiguration in the course of a single day.
to consult Swiss Tech Convention Center’s progress report for 2015-2017.
Lifespan far exceeding that of a venue
Data analysis of transformation activities also showed that the ‘wear-out’ phase of a Gala Venue seating system is virtually impossible to reach during the lifespan of a venue(4). The typical usage of the system does not come close to the level of use the technology was originally designed to endure. Suffice it to say, it will last longer than the life of the venue – it’s no wonder that no Spiralift unit has ever been replaced in any multipurpose hall to date.
THE PERFECT COMBINATION OF PERFORMANCE AND RELIABILITY
For almost 20 years, the Gala Venue seating system has brought high levels of operational flexibility to prestigious cultural institutions and conference centres around the world. Beyond its exceptional technical performance (speed and functionality), the system has also proven to be extremely reliable with a lifespan far surpassing that of a multipurpose venue. These positive outcomes stem from both the original robust design of the lifting technology and the commitment of an established team of engineers that has acquired expertise in the design of customized transformable venues. What has always made the Gala Venue seating system so attractive is the balanced combination of performance and reliability!
1. In 2017, a reliability study was carried out based on the transformation activities conducted in 18 Gala Venues between 2001 and 2016, involving 352 lifts and more than 200,000 up-and-down cycles. Consultation of the study on request.
2. This estimate corresponds to the transformations made in the 23 Gala Venues in service since their opening, assuming an average of 120 transformations annually.
3. Since the introduction of the Gala Venue seating system , only one part has needed to be replaced, in the first venue to open in Jonquière in 2002.
4. The time it takes to reach the wear-out phase of the Gala Venue seating system – i.e. the point at which its components begin to break down due to sheer use – is considerably longer than the lifespan of a venue, assuming such is 25 years (i.e., before the venue has to undergo major renovations).