Project Description
Overview
Since it was founded in 2009, The Baptist Church of the People has grown into one of Brazil’s largest Church ministries, with eleven churches serving communities across the country. Most recently, IBP has created a contemporary house of worship in São José, suburb of São Paulo, Brazil largest city. Having worked successfully with IBP previously on a project at Vila Mariana, also in São Paulo, WSDG was commissioned for the acoustic design for this new House of Worship. By engaging WSDG at the 2016 design stage, the Church planners were assured of providing their parishioners with superb acoustics for their worship services.
Program
Situated on the 2nd through 5th floors of a ground up building in a commercial section of São José, the new IBP Church is distinguished by a two-story high worship basilica with seating for 460 parishioners in the nave, and an additional 190 seats in the mezzanine. The 3rd, 4th and 5th floors are dedicated to classrooms and administrative offices. WSDG Partner/Director of Design Renato Cipriano reports the Church was as concerned with the quality of sound as they were with the aesthetics. “Our design team included architect/project manager Breno Magalhães, and NY-based project manager Kevin Peterson, who did excellent work on pre-visualizations and analysis of room acoustics. Our long-time WSDG contractor, Thiago Barros’s ATIMO firm did a flawless construction, and our A/V partner Jefferson Seifert of BIG SOUND developed a user friendly and cost effective AV system.
Design
The spacious 5900 sq. ft. IBP Church is distinguished by a 275”x 160” LED screen mounted on the wall behind the alter. A black stretched fabric, low frequency absorber frame eliminates both sound and light video display reflections. Three smaller flat screens are mounted in front of the mezzanine below the Allen & Heath iLive-T112 mixing console. The rear and side walls of the alter platform are treated with low, medium and high frequency absorbers. Similar stretched fabric and perforated wood treatments are mounted on the basilica walls. Some HVAC ducts were positioned on the left wall of the nave rather than in the perforated gypsum ceiling. Covered with stretched fabric over absorbent material these lowered soffits also contribute to enhancing sound quality throughout the Church. To further optimize sound quality, the pews feature handsome red cushions designed to serve as high frequency absorbers.