St. Patrick Catholic Church
Dallas, Texas
Project Type: Renovation
Seat Count: 800
Opening: 2011
Architect: Good, Fulton, Farrell / Halff and Assoc
AD Scope: Acoustics, Audio
Spoken word clarity and congregational participation in worship were two key elements of the St Patrick Church ReNEWal project. To transform the space, which was acoustically unresponsive for the desired worship experience, we preformed extensive testing onsite and developed a calibrated acoustic model of the space which allowed us to demonstrate to the client how changing specific elements of the space would impact the acoustics. We then compared our predicted results to measured results from several other Catholic churches in the area to further illustrate to the client how their new space would perform.
Creating the acoustically livened space also presented a challenge: ensuring uniform coverage and clarity of the spoken word. Using properly positioned, directional speakers we were able to achieve the goal. The sound system combines simple touch screen control of microphones used for speaking and also provides the full functionality of digital mixing console for music.
