Estonian National Theatre Vanemuine Invests in New Robe LED technology

	Many of the new fixtures were used on the acclaimed 2025 production of La boheme, lit by Swedish lighting designer Palle Palme. Photo: Maris Savik

Vanemuine, Estonia's oldest, largest, and most visited theatre, recently invested in more Robe moving lights as part of Estonia's "Green Turn" sustainability initiative, whereby all major theatres and performing arts centers are transitioning to LED stage lighting.

Under the technical leadership of Andres Sarv, Vanemuine's head of lighting, all three of its auditoriums -- The Grand Building of Theatre, The Small Building of Vanemuine, and The Harbour Theatre (black box) -- have benefited frominvestment in Robe lighting technology over the years, with the most recent purchases being in LED luminaires.

This has seen an additional fourteen T1 Profiles, fourteen T2 Profiles, eleven T11 Profiles, eight LEDBeam 350s, eight LedPOINTES, six iParFect 150 FQW RGBWs, and four T32 Cyc Slims added to the Vanemuine lighting inventory.

Many of the new fixtures were used on the acclaimed 2025 production of La boheme, lit by Swedish lighting designer Palle Palme.

While many of the new lights will reside in The Grand Building, servicing the largest and most complex productions, they can be moved around as and where needed between the three auditoriums, and can also go on the road with Vanemuine's various touring shows.

In The Grand Building, two RoboSpot systems are also new -- supplied as with all the LED fixtures by Robe's Tallinn-based distributor E&T Valgus -- but these are separate from the green turn investment. However, they can be used with many of the Robe fixtures, giving greater flexibility and enabling better followspot angles to do the job.

Vanemuine has been using Robe fixtures for at least the last 14 years, and the recent arrivals also prompted them to replace some of the older fixtures, like MMX Spots and 600E Spots, which were still working. In some cases, the older Robe moving lights, like LEDWash 1200s, are still in active service and used for powerful back light or other effects. Sarv comments that this reliability and longevity are a great asset.

The Small Building already had T1s in the house rig, but the Harbour Theatre's older Robe DLX Spots, in residence since 2013, were replaced with some of the new batch, joining the existing Robe LEDWash 600s in there, together with a host of conventional lights.

The new LedPOINTES, while more multipurpose than a purely theatrical fixture, will mainly stay in The Grand Building as they are ideal for musicals, and were "very well priced," Sarv says. He adds that the optics of the LEDBeam 350 are "great" for theatre, and naturally, and is delighted to have the additional power of the T2s in the house.

"The breadth of the T-Series ranges is fantastic," Sarv says. "There is a fixture to cover multiple needs, and Robe can provide a very consistent solution in terms of light quality and colour management." He is also enthused by the potential of the T32 Cyc Slims to provide even coverage for cycs and set pieces; the four units will replace 12 heavy lights that were previously used for this task.

Sarv works alongside a lighting crew of ten at Vanemuine across all three venues, which present theatrical shows and some orchestral concerts; the pace and turnarounds are very much rock-and-roll in style and speed.

In 2026, Vanemuine and Eesti Kontsert will bring Richard Wagner's tetralogy Der Ring des Nibelungen to the Saaremaa Opera Festival, beginning with Part I, Das Rheingold. In the following years, all four operas of the Ring Cycle will be presented, directed by Dutch opera director and set designer Michiel Dijkema.