Having first opened its doors in November 2018, Harris Academy Wimbledon is a co-educational secondary school based in Wimbledon, South-West London. Part of the Harris Federation multi-academy trust, the school offers 900 secondary pupils and 250 Sixth Formers an outstanding place to learn, providing an excellent education in an innovative and inclusive environment.  In November 2020, the school moved to a brand-new building, with the aim being to offer students a greater learning experience with even more facilities. Part of this included a brand-new Drama Studio and Main Hall, and the Academy approached WL to provide the lighting fixtures within these spaces.  

WL has grown a reputation for supplying schools and educational facilities with the very latest technical equipment. Harris Academy Wimbledon is perhaps the nearest institution that the company has worked with; located literally over the road from the company’s SW19 warehouse. Kathy Hofmeyr is the Assistant Principal and Director of Performing Arts at the Academy, who comments: “When we moved into our brand-new facilities on High Path, just across from Jubilee Way, whilst we had a lovely new Drama Studio and Main Hall, with all the required infrastructure in place including lighting grid, we had no lights to hang off it! I knew that we would need more specific lighting fixtures to support our teaching, especially the various performances, presentations and other events we’d host in the spaces. As such, I approached WL to have an initial conversation and see what they could offer”. 

Kathy worked closely with WL’s Business Development Manager Jonathan Haynes who visited the Academy to assess the spaces and see what fixtures would be most suitable. He explains: “It was clear from talking to Kathy that they wanted both spaces to be versatile, easy-to-use and above all easy to maintain. Neither spaces had any fixtures, lighting control or access equipment, so it was important that whatever was supplied needed to be user-friendly enough for the staff and the students to use. Once Kathy gave me a budget, I was able to select and demonstrate a selection of fixtures which I believed would be the most suited to all their specific needs”.  

It was the ColorSource range from ETC that seemed to tick all the boxes – high performance, quality fixtures with excellent colour mixing at an affordable price point. Their ease of use, along with the 10 year warranty, made it an easy win. Harris Academy made an initial investment in 8 x ColorSource Junior Spots and 18 x ColorSource Pars, controlled by ColorSource 20 consoles in both spaces. Blackbox wireless transceivers from Wireless Solution were also supplied to allow the lighting desk to be positioned in the auditorium for show programming and avoid restrictions of having to have the console connected to the physical DMX port that is situated backstage. Finally, a Scaffold Tower was also supplied with on site PASMA training for the staff. 

Jonathan explains: “We drew on these fixtures as they fulfilled all of the Academy’s needs of both flexibility, ease-of-use and robustness, given how they would be used every single day in their drama lessons. Quite often, we see schools with over complicated systems that overwhelm anyone but the most advanced users – this setup provides a rig that wouldn’t look out of place in a professional theatre but with a control system that anyone can walk up to and have confidence using. Given that the Main Hall as doubles as another drama studio, we wanted to have consistency throughout all of the spaces; something this equipment allows us to achieve”.  

Once delivered and rigged, the equipment was put to immediate use within the Academy. Kathy explains: “The fixtures were used straight away in our drama lessons, allowing students to obtain first-hand experience of using the very latest technology. It has also since been used on our first live performance in the Main Hall space as well as for our Winter Celebration. 

Supplying Harris Academy Wimbledon with the latest lighting technology is a further example of WL’s continued work with schools and other educational institutions. 

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