16 Dec 2009
Arup’s lighting designs for The New Acropolis Museum in Athens, University of Liverpool’s Active Learning Lab, and Liverpool’s Victoria Gallery and Museum have been selected as finalists for the Lighting Design Awards 2010.
The awards celebrate technical and aesthetic achievements in architectural lighting, and innovation in lighting technology, both in the UK and internationally.
The New Acropolis Museum displays the treasures of the Parthenon in similar light and spatial relationships to their original locations. Skylights allow daylight from above to graze the sculptures, adding dramatic effects to the flat light from the side windows. Theatrical lighting principles are used to reveal the character of the marble reliefs, and to subtly distinguish the surviving collection from the missing pieces.
Arup designed the façade lighting for Liverpool’s 19th Century Victoria Gallery and Museum. The red brick, Gothic Revival building features intricate brick and stone work alongside tall, slender stained glass windows. Situated in the heart of a university campus, Arup’s lighting design is intended to allow visitors to rediscover the museum in the campus’ nocturnal environment, providing a more symbolic and stimulating scene than the daytime view.
Features include lighting pinnacles with pencils of champagne white light using discrete projectors, and selected linear LED luminaries below the window ledges to sensitively light the stained glass and reveal the form of the arched stone work.
The University of Liverpool’s Active Learning Laboratory, developed with Sheppard Robson Architects, uses vibrant multicoloured images to 'paint' the façades with light in order to raise the profile of the university at night. The lighting effect can be programmed to display simple numbers, letters and geometric shapes as well as an infinite combination of lights, colours and morphing designs. The façade’s 1500m2 of glazing floats one metre above the main building and consists of alternate rows of clear glass and dotted panels using RGB linear luminaires.
The Lighting Design Awards winners are announced on 11 March 2010.
Arup’s lighting designers received a special award in the 2009 ceremony for ‘Web of Light’, a piece of public art commissioned by the Liverpool Biennial.
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