Voltereta, Immersive Light Installation

For the opening of the third gastronomic proposal of Voltereta, Vitamin is involved in a secret concept to create an interactive experience with a single and very important common goal: to generate emotions in the customers through a great journey that is not easily forgotten.

Voltereta bienvenido a Manhattan, which means welcome to Manhattan would be the new restaurant, but its concept went beyond this district of New York. This new proposal takes us back to the 1920s, when there was a dry law and speakeasy, venues where alcoholic beverages were sold illegally during the historical period of the United States known as Prohibition. These places were hidden, camouflaged under the facade of another business and functioned almost like private clubs far from the eyes of the authorities.

In the case of Voltereta, bienvenido a Manhattan, its front facade is a record and book store, it does not reveal its reality from the outside and makes customers live an experience very similar to what Americans experienced in 1920. From the first moment customers enter through the front door, it is obvious that this is not a typical space.

Vitamin began almost a year before the grand opening to devise a lightning experiential space that transports customers into a kind of time travel tunnel. Each trip would be different and we take advantage of the book theme to keep its facade hidden, using video mapping and interactivity in different applications as the main techniques.

Upon entering the establishment, customers are greeted by a host who invites them to take a test where each guest has the opportunity to interact by answering a question. This is how Vitamin creates the interactive aerial book, an interactive installation touch free and adapted to the pandemic that we have been experiencing since March 2020 due to Covid-19, respecting WHO’s and national authorities recommendations.

Vitamin devised this interactive installation where, using video mapping, questions are projected onto an open book and clients respond by placing their hand on one of the two laser object detection sensors, without having to touch them. The video mapping on the book is hidden and an APP created specifically for this is the one that generates the story as the answers are selected with the LIDAR sensors.

Each answer on the interactive book modifies the story that is told, both its colors, speed, light intensity and what happens itself, so that each group of people is responsible for creating their unique experience.

From here, a hidden door opens and leads to an immersive room that acts as a large three-dimensional time travel tunnel of 32 square meters made up of 420 3-meter strips with 20 LEDs each. When the door is closed, the immersive experience begins, controlling the 8400 LEDs produces light and sound visuals that create an unique experience for each group of customers. The LED strips are placed like a labyrinth, so that the users must pass making zigzags turns and the lighting reflected on the floor and mirrored walls. The feeling is of an infinite room and everyone experiences it in their own way.

The installation is inspired by a journey through space and time, the objective is to transport visitors 100 years ago using technology and art as propellants and main actors.

After crossing the immersive room or time travel tunnel, customers arrive at Manhattan in 1920, an atmosphere with feathers, wooden chairs, costumed waiters and all the fun is centered on the stage to the rhythm of live jazz and swing.

The restrooms are located on the exit hallway and the opportunity of the space to live another two-dimensional experience is not missed. Vitamin develops another interactive installation inside each of the cubicles using fiber optics in the ceiling as the only lighting for the small space.

The fiber’s LED lighting changes color as the door is opened, closed or the toilet chain is flushed, inside the cubicle all the walls and floors are mirrored so the experience of infinite space is repeated once more, on this occasion creating a world of changing color with each person as the main character of the interactive experience.

Voltereta, bienvenido a Manhattan is located on the Isabel la Católica street, number 11, in the center of Valencia. To date, both of Vitamin’s installations are adapted and focused on complying with health regulations, including social distancing and touch free.