Hard Rock Hotel Opens in Florida With Guitar-Shaped Building

Hard Rock Hotel Opens in Florida With Guitar-Shaped Building ⇒ Neon guitars have graced the signs in front of Hard Rock Cafe venues for decades – and now the company has scaled that symbol way, way up. As part of a US$1.5 billion expansion of the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Hollywood, Florida, the world’s first guitar-shaped hotel has now opened, adorned with a huge light screen facade.

With its eye-catching shape, the new hard rock hotel & casino has been designed by Klai Juba Wald to stand as a landmark for the area of south Florida. The volume covers 34-storeys and provides an extensive program including hotel accommodation, restaurants and a series of lush outdoor pools. Not only that, but the façade of the building is also lined with 16,800 ‘v-sticks’ (video fixtures using high-performance LEDs), which transform the built form into a dynamic sculpture.

The 34-story guitar towers 450 ft (137 m) into the South Florida skyline, taking on the familiar form of the instrument, complete with six strings running down the middle. At night, light “cannons” on the roof project the strings up to 20,000 ft (6,000 m) into the sky, creating the illusion of the neck of the guitar.

With music and entertainment being at the core of the hard rock brand, the front-facing elevation of the guitar serves as both a screen and a stage for daily musical performances. During a show, each v-stick will light up with different colours, speeds, patterns and directions, depending on the sequence. Marking the pinnacle of the building, the guitar ‘strings’ extend into the night sky thanks to rooftop light cannons that can be seen for miles around, effectively announcing the Seminole as a beacon for entertainment.

“Before a show, we have a moment where the installation is in a dormant state; the lights are ambient, fluid,” says Antoine Saint-Maur, Multimedia Director at Float4, the company that designs the light shows. “At that moment, we want guests to be able to congregate in anticipation, collectively anticipating the start of the show. That’s the feeling we want to create with the shows; we want to create a moment for Hard Rock guests and fans to come together and watch a daily celebration.”