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With the amusement park industry looking more and more for the best way to create immersive places and experiences for their visitors, designers and design firms are at the forefront, working increasingly on theming projects all over the world.
We focus today on one of these theming specialists, the Dutch company Jora Vision which is one of the leaders in the European market while looking for new challenges abroad. We had the opportunity to chat with Jan Maarten de Raad, owner and CEO of the company, during the last Euro Attractions Show in Berlin.
These past years, Jora Vision has completed theming projects mostly for theme parks (including at Efteling, Walibi Holland, Tivoli, Familiepark Drievliet and Futuroscope) but also for zoos (in The Netherlands, Sweden and China) as well as for recreational facilities, eg indoor miniature golf courses and FEC’s. The company also designs objects, sets and theming elements for various customers including TV shows and special events.
Last year, Jora Vision was in charge of making the theming a new attraction in Bruges, Belgium. “The Historium Brugge is a 35-minutes walkthrough experience inspired by the Golden Age of the city,” says Jan Maarten de Raad. “The attraction is divided into 7 themed rooms where we recreated several scenes of the Middle Age and used the five senses of the visitors to tell a story about two lovers. I think this is a very interesting concept for the tourist market.” At the same time, the company also worked on a couple of indoor children playgrounds for Center Parcs as well as on new theming for a small leisure park in Rotterdam (The Netherlands) called Plasweijck Park.
First steps for Jora Entertainment
In 2011, the company expanded its portfolio of business by launching a new subsidiary called Jora Entertainment whose job is to create and produce shows, special events and entertainments for the leisure industry, eg for amusement parks, FEC’s, zoo’s and resorts.
Led by Marjolein van de Stolpe, Jora Entertainment's team consists of 15 professionals, and in particular concept designers, script writers, project managers and specialists in attractions, showcontrol, sound, lightning design and special effects.
“The first project of Jora Entertainment was the production of a magic show on behalf of the amusement park Toverland in The Netherlands,” explains Jan Maarten de Raad. “Later in 2012, Europa-Park in Germany entrusted us with the job to develop three haunted houses for their Halloween celebrations (ed: Horror Nights starring Marc Terenzi). We are very proud of this specific project, first because it was very successful with the visitors and then because one of our house was considered by the Los Angeles Times newspaper as the best one of the year, ahead of 12 others haunted attractions worldwide.”
Moving on to new skills
The main highlight of the year for Jora Vision was definitely the involment of the company in the design work of Adventure World Warsaw, the most ambitious theme park and resort project in Eastern Europe whose opening is scheduled in Poland for 2015. Jan Maarten de Raad adds: “It is a big and great project for us! More than 30 people here are working full time, that’s quite a large number of designers, especially in Europe! This project has been very important in the further development of our company. Building it will be a historical step in European leisure industry comparable with Disney coming to Paris. The project is moving forward, we will start working on-site in April cause the winter is very harsh over there.”
With the Adventure World Warsaw project, Jora Vision is doing much more than only design work. The company now intends to be a full-fledged master planner as explains Jan Maarten de Raad “We have always worked for existing amusement parks in Europe and there were not so many new projects coming up in the region. Moreover, most of the new parks in planning are owned by large operators which have their own design team or work closely with international design firms, mostly from the United States. So we didn't really have a chance in the skill of master planning until we were invited to work on Adventure World Warsaw. We grew with this project which has evolved from a small leisure park to this large resort that has been announced. It really gives us the chance to demonstrate our master planning skills!”
Standing out from the competitors
With all that projects going around, how can a theming specialist company like Jora Vision stand out from its competitors? To this question, Jan Maarten de Raad answers “It’s true, the theming market is quite compettive. We like, at Jora Vision, to offer a complete turnkey solution from design to production and construction, so our customers can save a lot of money. We also do project management and we learn about the norms in each countries to avoid any extra costs for them. Integrating all these services into one really helps the customer, and it keeps the final price down.”
He adds, “In that way we can be very competitive and work faster as well, which is also important in this industry, because when people come up with a new idea or a new concept; they want this to be realized quickly. That’s why we have a large production facility with a staff specialized in various areas such as sculpting, wood work or artistic painting. With that organization, we can work on our efficiency and make quality projects for our customers.”
Current projects
Jora Vision is currently working on several theming designs for different customers in Europe. “At Walibi Belgium, we are working on the new theming for ‘Turbine’, an enclosed shuttle loop coaster from Schwarzkopf that opened in 1982. The ride closed a few years ago, so it is a complete makeover with the new characters and the musical universe of Walibi. Jora Entertainment is also doing the special effects, the sound system and all kind of stuff. That’s really a fun job, I can’t wait to see the ride back in action!”
Furthermore, the company was also entrusted with the project management of a new dark ride named ‘Volcans sacrés’ (Sacred Volcanoes) for the French edutainment park Vulcania, located in Saint Ours les Roches in the center of the country. “I am very proud to have won this tender,” explains Jan Maarten de Raad. “Volcans sacrés will be a very interesting dark ride. We offer a job turnkey by designing both the theming and the ride system which is supplied by ETF Ride Systems.” Scheduled to open in next March, ‘Volcans sacrés’ will immerse visitors into the story of legends about volcanoes through the ages.
Looking back, Jan Maarten de Raad is rather proud of the growth of Jora Vision. “We are enlarging our company to double the size, both the production facility and our design office,” he concludes. “More new things are coming up, because we are becoming a much bigger design firm within this industry. We will be involved more and more in new theme park development, for example in Russia or in Saudi Arabia on behalf of Snow village Jeddah.”
Jora Vision is getting ready for major new challenges!
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