On August 16, the Westfield World Trade Center Complex, encompassing 365,000 square feet of retail space in Lower Manhattan, opened for business, rewriting many of the traditional rules of shopping centers through the introduction of cross-platform brand marketing opportunities along with sponsorships for global brands such as Ford, Pepsi, and JP Morgan Chase.
Westfield’s business model here has evolved from rent paid by tenants representing traditional retail categories to one more nuanced and cognizant of the potential afforded by corporate sponsorships.
Under the direction of Westfield’s Brand Ventures division, the company’s “Premier Partnerships” include multi-year product and vending rights, high-profile event hosting, and brand showrooms.
It’s also a model that’s more digital savvy, as the Westfield Brand Ventures division also offers digital out-of-home advertising exclusivity throughout the site’s state-of-the-art media network.
This solution, featuring nineteen digital screens, includes a unique 4mm LED display measuring 280 feet long and featuring 12 continuous HD outputs that can be driven natively and is part of the larger canvas in the building in precise frame synch across 18 other displays.
ANC of Purchase, New York, provided, supervised, and integrated over 5,000 square feet of LED throughout the Westfield World Trade Center Complex, creating a dynamic and immersive state-of-the-art experience. As part of a long-term service agreement with Westfield, ANC helps them set up and program the displays as well as handles maintenance.
ANC worked on this top-secret project, from start to finish, for three years after being first contacted by Westfield reps asking their opinion on different display technologies.
“We reviewed different technology options with them—LED, LCD, tiled video wall, etc.,” says Chris Mascatello, executive vice president of Technology Sales & Services with ANC, “and it soon became apparent that a high-resolution LED product was going to be the best option for their big picture vision.”
During these discussions, ANC also started mapping out the control system requirements for this massive integrated multimedia rollout, especially focusing on a 280-foot-long, wall-mounted display that runs along the East-West Concourse.
“We’re driving over 20,000 lineal pixels by 720 pixels tall from one rendering appliance, the highest in the world,” says Mascatello. “It was a lot of work on the part of our hardware and software teams internally to make sure we could deliver the promise of having the highest output uncompressed images possible and give Westfield and their advertisers a canvas where they can dress every single pixel and not have to use graphic tricks or tiling.”
In addition to the 10-foot-tall-by-280-foot-long 4mm LED display in the West Gallery, these state-of-the-art screens also include:
- Four separate 4mm LED displays totaling more than 800 square feet and 3.9 million pixels greeting consumers as they cross underneath the 9A Underpass. These pick up where the East-West Concourse display ends but are located on the opposite wall. “We treated it as one digital media canvas that covers you,” says Mascatello, “almost a 400-foot walkway with LEDs on either side;”
- Thirteen 4mm displays spread across two levels throughout the complex and the signature Oculus structure; and
- A seventy-foot-tall transparent LED display encasing Tower 4’s lobby glass elevator designed to be non-invasive from a viewer standpoint both inside the elevator looking out and inside the lobby looking toward it. ANC used vertical-running LED module sticks with custom 15mm pixel spacing that allowed for transparency and the power and data distribution to be handled at the bottom and top of the screen.
All the screens at the Westfield World Trade Center allow for a wide range of custom messaging (including live streaming) for major names and brands and can be run concurrently or individually. Content is generated and managed using ANC’s proprietary vCOMM platform.
There’s a very flowing, very organic type of aesthetic in the look of the displays, as they had to blend with the architectural design. Mascatello remarks that, because of this, there was a lot more coordination involved with this project than ANC typically encounters.
For example, the $3.9 billion Oculus structure, designed by internationally acclaimed architect Santiago Calatrava, hosts the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey transit hub and serves as a connection between New Jersey’s PATH trains and New York City’s subways.
“There was a lot of interplay in trying to aesthetically please a lot of the architectural masters involved here, as well as deal with the massive-scale construction going on above ground and underground,” says Mascatello. “Then we had to work with the Port Authority (who controls the property) and Westfield (the tenant).”
ANC selected different New York area sign companies to handle different parts of the project based on their intimate knowledge of what was required at the location and the schedule.
During installation at this massive construction site, ANC focused on certain areas first that were a little bit farther ahead from a general contracting level.
“We delivered to site in smaller quantities, more or less, what we could work on for a three- to five-day period because there wasn’t much lay-down area within the site with all the other construction going on,” says Mascatello, noting this included general contractors as well as retailers furnishing their storefronts.
Because these displays were going to be installed in hallways and atria with reflective white marble, ANC pretty much knew the brightness of the screens was going to fall between 20 and 40 percent for them.
“Westfield and Port Authority reps walked the venue and settled on a brightness level that was 35 to 36 percent of the system’s capability, somewhere in the 400- or 500-Nit level,” says Mascatello. “This gives enough ‘pop’ to the full range of content without becoming an overwhelmingly bright eyesore to passers-by.”
One of the most easily accessible destinations in New York City, Westfield World Trade Center is expected to generate nearly 285 million annual impressions (residents, commuters, tourists, etc.). That’s a lot of people that will be immersed in this digital experience.
ANC has, at least, a further decade-plus relationship with this project through service, operation, and maintenance and anticipates display add-ons down the road.
“There are places for digital media you don’t realize until it becomes a live environment,” says Mascatello, “like charging stations or areas where people linger to have phone conversations or send emails.”
Being a New York company, ANC is happy with how everything turned out.
“We all have a lot of personal investment in the success of the new Westfield World Trade Center,” says Mascatello. “Any light that we shine on the rebirth of Lower Manhattan is something we’re very happy to participate in.”
By Jeff Wooten
Photos: ANC
