Natural light determines everything around us. It informs our perception of colour, determines how we read shape and texture and animates our surroundings with patterns of light and shadow.
Without light we see nothing. When we look at an object we are in fact interpreting the light that is reflected from it. Our eyes are continuously responding to light, changing, adapting and manipulating it, reducing and increasing contrast. Yet light is much more than what we actually see. It fundamentally affects how we feel and influences our moods. One of the most important inventions over the last 200 years is artificial light, which has had one of the biggest psychological impacts on man. However, we don't realise how big that impact is.
Artificial light alters our bodies' natural rhythms in a really profound way, and we are only just starting to understand its implications. As a lighting designer, I am responsible for 'extending' the day, to create light and life after sunset, to create spaces for people to enjoy and to create pleasant and sustainable work and commercial spaces, which people are deprived of during daytime.
Unfortunately, there are a few misconceptions that a lighting designer might be an artist or a painter. The element of art is there, but it can only be there in a very cautious and responsible way. Lighting up a façade or a monument, which is exposed to the public (thus, you are responsible for the physiological impact on so many people night after night), is not exactly about experimenting with a bunch of luminaries just for the sake of saying that another lighting design scheme is there for people to enjoy.
It is only when the great science of light and lighting is studied well and clearly understood that a lighting designer can handle the responsibility of blending together science and art to provide an interesting, motivating and sustainable lighting design scheme.
Sustainability in lighting design needs to be approached holistically. For a lighting design scheme to be sustainable there are five basic criteria, each holding equal importance and none should be hindered or neglected; just like a chef's recipe, if one ingredient is missing, the whole concept fails.
Economic and environmental sustainability
As a lighting designer entrusted to provide a design scheme, I am responsible for the use of energy. The hard facts about lighting's contribution to CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) production are very clear, and we would be wrong to dispute them; instead we should work to find real solutions to address this problem.
If you inject enough money, the problem is solved, but this is a limited solution. Sustainability needs to be achieved at the same cost as conventional design - or at least when 'whole life' costs are taken into account (this is definitely not being implemented at the moment).
With a building, this can often be difficult, as the turnkey contractors, together with the developers, are not the people who will live in it. From a domestic point of view we're seeing a bombardment of adverts urging us to change tungsten lamps to Custom Fluorescent Lamps (CFLs).
I believe the only people who stand to gain here are the manufacturers! It's certainly a great drive by the manufacturers, who are insulting people's intelligence. We cannot do away with incandescent lighting in our homes. Diminishing the quality of light in our homes will have severe physical and physiological effects on us.
In the majority of towns and cities I visit, I come across various public lighting systems - old and new - switched on all day and all year round, while daylight is there and is available free of charge!
It makes more sense to return to the correct use of daylight in architecture and do our best to include as much daylight as possible in our buildings, which is both economically sustainable and psychologically motivating for our well being.
Socially interactive lighting design schemes
Proper lighting design schemes do not take place in bulk! There is no point in installing a lighting scheme just for the sake of saying that a town or city has another finished project. It might be finished but is not appealing and is probably an eyesore.
A current example of light pollution or spam lighting is lighting up arches from the inside, the concept being that it creates volume, which contrasts daylight.
For one or two arches this works perfectly well, but if one has a set of 20 arches in a row that are lit up uniformly, the whole idea of volume is lost and instead it looks like the spotlights used for the installation were cheaper by the dozen, and the whole scheme looks flat.
A lighting scheme needs to interactive either with the residents, or if we're talking about an exterior lighting, it needs to feel the pulse of the local population.
One fact that I have never been able to understand here in Malta is why on approaching some night clubs, very often you see spotlights throwing beams of light literally and directly into the sky just for the sake of creating an effect.
But what is this? Has anyone ever heard of the Dark Skies Association? Is it possible that it never occurred to these people that these horrible ideas go back to Vegas in the early Seventies? Nobody wants to see this waste.
Illumination schedule and brightness
One of the most challenging parts of designing a lighting scheme is to blend it with its surroundings. Isn't it a waste to have a monument in the middle of a very quiet village lit up with the amount of light levels that you use in a top night-time activity city centre?
If the lighting scheme is worked out correctly, a much lower level of illumination would result in an appropriate atmosphere with possibly no lighting spilling into people's bedrooms at night.
This also applies to interiors when designing a place or a complex. Each space must be designed according to various needs, and both the illumination and brightness levels need to be set to create the ideal atmosphere.
We need to keep in mind that our eyes see in vertical planes, so the aim should be not only that of having an office lit up to a horizontal illuminance of 500 lux, but also to have an office that is visually appealing to those occupying it.
Lighting design as a profession
The fulcrum in lighting design is also important. As a design member in the Association for Professional Lighting Designers, our way forward is to promote lighting design as much as possible as a truly independent profession.
There is no such thing as looking at lighting design by trial and error, but as a profession, which is studied independently at colleges and universities abroad, just like any other profession.
We work hand in hand with architects, interior designers and engineers, and our work renders a place visually appealing, offering quality of life to those people who will make use of the space entrusted to us.
We interpret the dreams of other professions with both daylight and artificial light to create holistically a truly sustainable lighting scheme. In October, London will host the biggest milestone for lighting design - the First Global Lighting Designers convention - which will be attended by people from all over the world.
Lighting is for people, not only for areas.
Olivia@professionallightingdesign.com
Olivia-Ann Calleja, LET Dip. (London), ILE Dip. (Birmingham), has studied light and lighting design at South Bank University, London and at the Institute of Lighting Engineers in Birmingham. She is also a design member of the Professional Lighting Designers association and also a fully qualified electrical technician (Website: www.professionallightingdesign.com; tel: 2141-7866 or 7999-5995)