Parishioners at St Matthew’s are seeing things in a new light!

[CLS ELECTRICAL SERVICES LTD – also known as Church Lighting Systems – were given the task of updating the existing lighting system in St Matthew’s Church in Worthing, which mostly consisted of tungsten halogen floodlights providing the main illumination throughout the church. Not very energy efficient!

After CLS carried out an inspection of the existing installation, they confirmed that the existing control equipment and most of the wiring could be kept and re-used, keeping the overall cost of the project as low as possible to meet the church’s budget.

Following the supply of a lighting design and faculty-ready specification, work began to increase the overall light levels within the church while reducing the overall energy consumption. All the tungsten halogen fittings were removed and replaced with 4,000lm LED spotlights, providing both general and focused lighting to important areas of the church.

It was important to add architectural lighting to the church, which was lacking in the previous installation. Small dimmable LED fittings were installed to illuminate the eight arches in the nave and were added onto the existing control system.

As worship at St Matthew’s involves live music, new coloured lighting was requested to be installed within the chancel. Two 50W RGBW LED floodlights were installed within the arches in the chancel, together with five 30W RGBW LED floodlights within the apse windows. Again, to keep the overall cost to a minimum, the light fittings are controlled with a handheld RF remote control, offering many colour changing options.

Upon completion CLS provided a training session with members of the church, showing them how to make changes to the programming of the lighting system in the future. Lighting scenes were also set up according to the requirements of the church.

Dr Ian Normansell of the PCC explained how the project unfolded: “We began planning our work with CLS before the pandemic and then the inevitable delay happened while the church temporarily closed, and fundraising stopped.

“CLS adjusted with great professionalism to our new timeline and budget. They understood our revised financial constraints and devised a lighting scheme which delivered everything we wanted at a cost we could afford.

“Once work began it progressed quickly and to schedule. The quality of their work was faultless and Adrian, Jamie and Stewart were a pleasure to work with. They were considerate, worked well alongside other contractors and tidied up brilliantly at the end of each week so we could still run our Sunday services.

“The result of their lighting installation is everything we hoped for, transforming the appearance of the church. If you choose to engage CLS to carry out work, you will not be disappointed – you will find them to be highly professional, skilled, excellent value, flexible, tidy and a true delight to work with.” q