Cirque du Soleil's Light Club Coming Into Focus

The notoriously particular Cirque du Soleil team keeps adding new details to their Mandalay Bay club concept and edging towards officially branding the nightclub, Light. As befitting the name, the evolving Cirque design for the multi-tiered venue, produced in conjunction with The Light Group, will be blinding in theatrical lighting techniques.

Under a neon sign spelling out Light, the semi-circular front entrance will glow with a pattern of rays of light emanating from the arched doorway. A glass framed LED video display adds to the shine. A hidden door just for VIPs will be inserted into the frontage and the ticket kiosk will also disappear behind a sliding panel during closing hours. Inside, a retail store is now the first thing guests see, before mounting the stairway into the club. The upholstered walls on the way up create their tufting affect not by fabric buttons, but through embedded LED lights.

Light will feature an acrobatic wall for Cirque performances, winched dancers dropping from the ceiling, an enormous digital display wall and the introduction of Las Vegas' first levitating DJ booth. Smoke effects and shadows will create a mysterious and shifting visual landscape.

Early concepts had placed less emphasis on the dance floor, but this has been adjusted and the dance space has been expanded. Banquettes surrounding the dance floor are now removable, to further boost the square footage if necessary. The number of mirrored dancer poles on each of the three floors has also been increased, another element designed to bounce light.

Heavy emphasis has been placed on the sound system and sticking with a Vegas club tradition, in addition to fog and haze and snow machines, two large confetti cannons have been ordered. Both are capable of launching a pound of confetti per second, to a height of eighty feet. The Light club is expected to open in spring 2013.

· All Coverage of Light Club [~ELV~]
The future home of Light Club [Photo: Chelsea McManus]