The team behind Strategic Tao Group recently transplanted its über-successful New York and Las Vegas nightclub concept, Marquee, the Star in Sydney, the city’s premier entertainment destination. “We felt that Sydney needed a club like Marquee; the market is very music conscious and we saw that there was a need for a state of the art dance club and performance space which are key variables in our Marquee facilities in the U.S.,” explains Noah Tepperberg, one of the co-founders of the Strategic Tao Group.

For the design, Tepperberg and his partners turned to New York-based ICRAVE, who had designed Lavo restaurant and nightclub in New York for them. “We tasked ICRAVE with creating an American club with an Australian sensibility; we wanted the design to feel very New York and Vegas, but with a twist that would help foster appeal amongst the local Sydney based target audience.”

Adds ICRAVE founder Lionel Ohayon: “We were on the same page with the program for the space: that it needed to have a high energy nightclub and a luxury lounge. Star Casino was looking for a first rate nightclub and we wanted to make something that had impact, a sense of discovery, and play off the drama of the view where we could.”

But first, the designers had to figure out how to work with the unusual hourglass, low-ceilinged space. Says Ohayon, “Figuring out the layout was further complicated by the fact that the club sat adjacent to an operable glass wall overlooking the Sydney harbor and a glass wall that overlooked the other four floors of the Star casino. This posed a major problem in containing the sound and became the first and most important challenge in creating a solution for sound attenuation in a first rate nightclub.”

For the ceilings, the designers used a reflective surface and a strong circular lighting scheme emanating from the DJ booth in front of a high-res LED wall to become the focal point feature of the space. Behind the DJ booth is an operable high definition LED screen. This opens up to reveal a performance stage and brings the private bar behind into the flow of the main dance floor. Costumed dancers on raised podiums add drama and spectacle, while an array of lasers and hazer machines “take the show above and beyond any other club experience,” he says.

“We have translated the Las Vegas experience in a very different space. The Sydney location is really an evolution of the New York and Las Vegas locations-the next in the series. It has a totally different look but a similar high-energy vibe. The basic elements, the Boom Box, the English parlor, the main club, the private lounge, library, and outdoor areas are represented, however the physical nature of the spaces are dramatically different.”