Illuminarium Experiences, a new experiential entertainment company, will be opening its first location on Atlanta’s BeltLine on July 1st, offering visitors the chance to virtually travel to Africa through WILD: Safari Experience. Earlier this month, the company announced that it had raised $100 million in initial funding, which will support the launch of its first venue.
The experience, which will allow visitors to “step off the BeltLine and into Africa,” will project cinematic content featuring African landscapes and wildlife – produced by Radical Media – onto a 350-foot-long and 20-foot-high canvas. It will also include spatial audio, a haptic floor, and lidar-based interactive technologies that will fully immerse guests in the environment.
While VR continues to evolve and improve, one of the biggest sticking points when it comes to the technology remains the hardware, which is expensive and often cumbersome. However, Illuminarium aims to provide an immersive, VR-like experience that doesn’t require a headset or any external equipment. Visitors can simply wander the space and experience the sights, smells, and sounds of a faraway place.
"In Illuminarium Experiences, we have created a global experiential brand that will produce unprecedented entertainment to transport consumers to many of the most coveted places and experiences on Earth, and beyond," said Alan Greenberg, CEO of Illuminarium Experiences, in a statement.
Illuminarium will also offer Illuminarium After Dark, a nightlife option in the form of a bar that will leverage the venue’s technology to immerse visitors in changing landscapes.
Following WILD, Illuminarium Atlanta will present SPACEWALK, which will bring audiences on a trip to space and allow them to experience what it’s like to walk on the Moon and Mars. The company will open two more locations in the near future – at Area 15 in Las Vegas in early 2022 and later at Mana Wynwood Miami – and plans to launch 40 more locations around the world in the next few years.