After years of pandemic, HQ is back and office buildings are once again serving customers, employees, and the company Brand with a capital B. Statement lobbies and other forms of office display design can be a new kind of investment in drawing people out of them home and into public spaces again. The KPMG is one splashy example.
Located in the central business district in the heart of downtown Los Angeles, KPMG Center is a boutique, 28-story LEED-Platinum certified building that includes over 600,000 square feet of Class-A office space. Originally built in 1991, KPMG Center owners Morgan Stanley and LBA Realty recently partnered with global design and architecture firm Gensler on renovations to the building’s two-story lobby, tenant lounge, conference center, and outdoor terrace. The updated lobby features several design improvements including a new coffee kiosk, elegant seating areas and new interior landscaping. The grand centerpiece is a massive digital art canvas covering one of the walls.
Measuring nearly 74 feet wide and 11 feet high, the installation is a Planar TVF Series LED video wall with a 2.5mm pixel pitch (TVF2.5) in a 37×10 configuration. Digital signage agency Grandview Digital designed the LED video wall and will be managing, creating, and curating content for the display. For assistance with the project, Grandview partnered with MediaCentric for the installation, commissioning, and programming.
Grandview founder James Ravenel was initially approached by LBA Reality during the design phase, when the project team became interested in supplementing the lobby with a digital experience, something that would work well with the architecture and support their vision for the reimagined space. “Over a two-year period, we worked closely with Gensler and the owners on the concept and design and developed several versions,” Ravenel explained. “Ultimately, we settled on a giant panoramic canvas.” The biggest challenge to the project involved installing such a massive LED display across an irregular wall surface marked by three elevator foyer openings. “Most video walls are built from the bottom up, but in this case, we had to take a custom approach to cope with the three elevator walkways,” said MediaCentric President and CEO David Lopez. “We had to uniquely build up, over, and down each opening, and then level every row across the gaps.” “For a video wall this big, the design flexibility of the Planar TVF Series modules was a useful feature,” according to Eric Broyles, regional manager and technical specialist with MediaCentric. “Adjustments on the cabinet corners made it easy to fine-tune as we went along to ensure that no seams were visible and that the video wall was completely straight,” he said.
LED Technology Creates Immersive Space Content for the large Planar TVF Series LED video wall has been carefully selected and will include a combination of thematic scenery and custom digital artwork. “It’s a beautiful, breathtaking lobby and the intention of the LED canvas is to create an immersive, calming atmosphere—a place that will draw people to come and unwind,” Ravenel said. Thematic imagery created for the LED video wall blends static and video content that dynamically moves through varying backdrops, changing intermittently throughout the day to different landscapes that can include beach, forested, mountain, and urban scenes, according to Ravenel. For sourcing artistic content, local artists will be engaged to create digital murals specifically tailored to the LED video wall. “We will add after-effect animation to the murals to give them movement,” Ravenel said. “Integrating animation into a digital landscape is something you can only do with LED. It’s a very interesting way to embrace digital art in a physical environment.” To keep content fresh, Grandview will make bi-monthly updates, bringing in new scenes from new curated playlists and showcasing work from different artists. “What’s really exciting is that the LED video wall is not used to push a brand or sell a product,” Ravenel said. “Rather, it’s about using technology to create something meaningful.”
