Singapore – Hyderabad – Singapore – Weekend 12-13 December 2015
It’s been a long year…
This will be my last blog of the year…I still have another week to go before jetting off to Australia for my Xmas and New Year holidays together with my family and friends. I have been traveling long and hard this year and some quality time off with my loved ones is something I dearly crave…writing my blog on my first day of holiday is therefore unlikely to happen… :). I could not have imagined at the beginning of the year that I would be travelling so much, so frequently and so far. Europe to the West and Tahiti to the East (or further West if you want). At this point I can but thank my team for their relentless and unwavering support throughout this year. Each and every member of my team have made remarkable progress in becoming better and better and with that maintaining and improving the service delivery to our dear clients with the professional attitude expected from our practice. Thank you all for that! There are always comings and goings in a company, with some pursuing other career interests, but the key to all is a tight and happy family who have each-others back and love the work they do. I am therefore pleased to welcome Bruce to our team, who no doubt will help us grow to become even better. Welcome to the family! On a sad note we suffered the unexpected loss of Navin Krishen, our business partner in India, who died of cancer after a short but brave battle a few months ago. His parting is a great loss to our team but also to the greater lighting community in general. He was highly respected by his peers…our thoughts are with his wife Lillian who has now taken upon her to keep the business going…we wish you well.
The year that was…
All in all we had a good year of consolidation, many new and interesting projects, mainly centred around hospitality as our mainstream project constant, but thankfully supplemented with projects in heritage, corporate, retail, F&B, entertainment, residential, landscape and urban redevelopment applications. I have always been a strong believer that a good lighting designer needs to cross-fertilise him or herself with the experience from varying and different lighting applications to avoid tunnel vision in designing specific projects. Experience and knowledge we acquire in other applications help create stronger lighting concepts in general. Several projects were proudly commissioned this year which we reported on through publications and social media. It was also the year that we have launched ourselves into social networking with active reporting through Facebook, Twitter and Instagram finding a new audience of followers. Public appearances at lighting related events have also been a constant feature of my personal activities, educating and sharing my knowledge and expertise in the process. This is a very gratifying part of our activities that is set to continue in the new year without slowing down…Of course my blog (now weekly) and publicized articles have been a regular item on this years menu…I have and still find it extremely gratifying to work on projects (by the grace of our appreciative clients), blog about and write about my experiences in doing so and educating the general community through my public speaking engagements. It is specifically the acknowledgements and positive feedbacks received that makes it all worth doing. Thank you all!
Hyderabad
And oh yes…I did travel this week…to Hyderabad in India, of which I just returned this morning. A client who had been remarkably patience with us as they has asked us to come to site since October already! It’s just that my schedule was so full that I simply could not reasonably fit it in…so much for insisting that I wanted to be present at this kick-off meeting! But it was worth the waiting for all…For us it allowed us to get really well prepared for the visit with a comprehensive presentation on the proposed lighting approach, something really needed considering none of the consultants team members had ever worked with a professional lighting designer before, so being able to explain our role and share our vision on the lighting and the proposed lighting concept opened the eyes for all present. Not surprisingly we had a very eager and complete team hanging on to every word of our presentation and appreciating the typical lighting design issues being explained and clarified to them. The site team and ourselves in the time leading up to the visit had ample time to smooth out communication and other project matters resulting in both teams being prepared for the meeting which as a result was very fruitful and left everyone in great spirits and happy they had appointed a lighting designer…great way to end this year! Below some impressions of the site, the meeting and old Hyderabad city at night…
To each and every one of you, thanks for following my blog, thanks for your valuable feedbacks and encouragements (which have kept me going for 6 years now!) it means a lot to me. Looking forward to catching up in the New Year!
Have a great weekend, a merry Xmas and Happy New Year…take care!
The week that was 30 November- 4th December
Singapore – Auckland – Papeete – Bora Bora – Papeete – Auckland – Singapore
Weekend 5 – 6 December 2015
Travelling back in time
This week’s travel to Tahiti was by far the most arduous trip that I undertook this year…Not only because of its length, but also because of the date line crossing. Leaving on Monday morning from Auckland to arrive Sunday afternoon the day before in Tahiti, going back 23 hours in time zone. The good thing is that your body is not really uprooted, you are just doing the same day over again…a bit like Groundhog Day…
While many people tweeted “lucky bastards” or “jealous!” for being there, the truth is that besides taking a lot of picturesque shots, we were there to work, making us feel a bit odd walking around assessing the site, taking notes and talking to the general manager and maintenance engineer while the real holiday makers were dipping in the pool or sea, sipping a cocktail and enjoying the gorgeous views, probably wondering what we were doing. I tried to look inconspicuous by wearing my Bermuda’s and T-shirt, but I guess wandering around with project files and drawings, taking pictures of down lights and switchboards gave us away… 🙂
In order to meet on site for 2 days we had to leave Singapore on a Sunday morning arriving in Auckland after a 10 hour flight. With only limited flights to Tahiti we found ourselves staying overnight at the airport hotel as to catch the early morning flight on Monday to Papeete, Tahiti’s capital, another 5 hour plus flight. If that were not enough we transferred on an island hopping small plane that finally landed us in Bora Bora where we hopped on board a little motor boat for the 30 min trip to our final destination, the Hilton Hotel Resort on the atoll island called MotuToopua.
Iaorana Bora Bora
We arrived in the middle of the night after a bouncy trip on the choppy seas and the first thing that struck us was that we had no idea where we had arrived…mostly dark with only a few (glary) lights here and there did not unveil anything of what the resort looked like; no feel of the extent of the resort, no feel of landscape of physical proportions. I made a mental note that part of the renovation that we are going to undertake should absolutely include lighting the resort in such ways that it reveals itself to excited guests arriving at the resort after along and tiring trip at night. After the customary flower garlands and welcome drinks we thankfully retreated to our villa (no such things as rooms in this resort) for a much needed recovery rest…
It was only at breakfast in the morning that we could truly say: “Iaorana Bora Bora”…(hello Bora Bora)! The stunning views, amazing white beaches, waving palm trees and clear blue seas fully matching up with expectations. However the elations was short lived as we were brought back to the realities of the day. While the amazing views remained as a backdrop throughout the day we had to (reluctantly) focus on the work at hand, the renovation of the resort and upgrading to Conrad level of sophistication. With the 4 Seasons, St Regis and Intercontinental hotel resorts also active nearby, this 15 year old resort is indeed in need of some TLC.
Logistics and energy supply
This is obviously not your average sort of project as the circumstances are rather unique with the location far and remote from anywhere in the world. Logistics and energy supply are the obvious key elements that spring to mind. Just getting us there was already a logistical (and costly) nightmare; 32 hours on the way and 46 hours back! Just imagine the logistics for the importation of light fittings! Because of the harsh tropical climate (mixed with some occasional cyclones) the quality of the lights has to be top of the class and while China made lighting products may be eyed for economic reasons, durability and serviceability have to be part of the equation. Our site assessment showed us that both were seriously missing. Energy, not surprisingly, is expensive so a transition to LED technology is the obvious move forward and making sure we implement light only where and when needed (zoning/ time controlled) will be the way to go.
Lighting design the difference
It was also obvious from our site review that the original lighting had not been designed by a professional lighting designer (if it has been than it does not show any remaining traces that it ever was), with poorly lit areas, mostly glary light fittings and wrong light fitting choices. I guess that is why we are here now and by applying basic lighting design principles I am confident we can turn this into a stunning and above all magical memorable night time resort experience. The challenge will be to balance logistics and costs versus local implementation and energy management. We look forward to it…
Have a great weekend
Impressions of our trip…
The week that was 23-27 November
Singapore – Dubai – Abu Dhabi – Dubai – Singapore, Weekend 28-29 November 2015
Guest speaking
Another week, another trip, this time to Abu Dhabi via Dubai, where I am attending the Smart Lighting and Energy Summit as one of the guest speakers. I get quite a lot of requests to speak at this type of events and generally, depending on the intended audience and location I do accept these, provided I am not out of pocket. Most of these events run on tight budgets (for those participating) as we should never forget that these events are organised by companies that are in it to make money, it is not a charity to provide you with free information. And because these event organisers are in it for the profit their focus is generally different from yours. They want their speakers at the cheapest possible rates, offering economy class flight tickets (if you are lucky) and accommodation. I have had an invitation for one just recently (about 6 hours flight away from Singapore!) where they were offering only $200 in expense compensation and free access to the event…hello! The general consensus is that as a speaker with long distance flights you get a business class return ticket with full accommodation and expenses paid. Speaker fees are a common norm at professional events such as PLDC or Light Fair for instance but even that is generally not a fat pot.
I guess it is also to do with your notoriety. I am generally prepared to wave my speaker fees, provided all the rest is taken care for. Sometimes you have to help the event organisers in finding sponsors, which I do regularly as that helps facilitate getting me there. This trip was no different with lengthy negotiations where they tried all tricks from the book to minimise their costs. I finally accepted after my minimal terms and conditions were accepted and signed off.
It’s all in the preparation
Speaking at such event, like this Summit in Abu Dhabi, does expect a certain level of expertise and professionalism from the speakers, certainly also considering that the event was patronised by the Abu Dhabi municipality and attended by some of the government ministers, in this case the ones responsible for infra- structure, development and transport if I understood that correctly. So knowing your stuff is of course important but knowing what and how to share that with the attending audience is a totally different ball game. You generally have either great subjects but poor speakers or vice versa, great speakers with poor subjects. Having both in one is a rarity! I pride myself of being one of those who can combine a slightly provocative subject into an entertaining presentation, at least if I can believe the feedback I receive from those attending my presentations. And it is all in the preparations. You need to understand who the attendees are going to be, what the cultural context is against which this event is held and make sure that your subject fits within the overall theme of the event. After all people come to the event with certain expectations based on the pre-event advertisements.
You get what you pay for
So this event was called the smart lighting and energy summit (Middle East) and was lavishly sponsored by many well-known lighting manufacturers, most of them with already significant fingers in the UAE and or Middle East market pie. The downside to me was the fact that they had obviously negotiated very significant amount of speaking time from the overall program, resulting in more than fifty percent of the speakers being “commercially motivated” rather than sharing professional expertise, promoting their products and services in the process, which to me is the unfortunate flipside of these events. I want to learn something or get introduced to new concepts, get some new food for thoughts, not sitting in on an ego tripping journey. In all fairness to the event it was not that bad, there were some good stories, some interesting project study cases and I definitely went away with some new ideas. But overall I thought the program was a bit weak with not enough high quality expert speakers, no doubt some of them having kindly declined for lack of proper financial reimbursement. You get what you pay for I guess…
Smart lighting design
So my subject was (not surprisingly) “smart lighting design”, originally with the subtitle “The challenges and opportunities of today’s LED technologies”, but as I was preparing the presentation it soon became apparent that these issues would be covered by many of the other speakers so I changed my tack and modified the subtitle to read: “The challenges of the future ahead” allowing me to look at today’s LED situation as well as looking ahead to a new attitude in lighting and lighting design; a concept that I have recently come to treasure and appreciate as a “must consider” approach to lighting and lighting design. The LED Cowboys still figure in my presentations but they have now made way for the future…”Light as a Service (LaaS) or also know under the name of Pay-per-Lux schemes. It is a major shift from today’s waste economy, where products are designed to fail (and be disposed after useful life) to a circular economy where products are designed to last, be reconfigured, re-used or re-cycled, with practically no waste over years. It requires a dramatic change of attitude towards designing lighting products from the side of the manufacturers. I mentioned this in one of my previous blogs and I gratefully took the opportunity to present the concept to a summit audience eager to understand more about how that could work. There is no doubt that the LED technology will play a big role in making this work.
I enjoyed my time in Abu Dhabi as well as in Dubai on my way back. Below some impressions from the event as well as some Abu Dhabi night time city sights, which we took in on an organised tour of the city.
Have a great weekend
The week that was November 16-20
Singapore – Shanghai – Guilin – Yangshuo – Guilin – Shanghai – Singapore, Weekend 21-22 November 2015
The perils of travel around the globe
As the header may already indicate I am in for a fair bit of travel lately. While the site is gorgeously located in the middle of the Guiling Mountains which is famous for featuring on the back of the Chinese 20 dollar RMB note, the travel this time of the year is arduous to say the least. At this time of the year there are hardly any flights to and from Guilin due to being out of season and as a result we are left with travel options that are not in the least pleasant or attractive. After scouting around for the best link from Singapore to Guilin the route via Shanghai came out as the best solution albeit a very long one. As it turned out it took in the end 17 hours (!) from leaving my apartment in Singapore to reaching the hotel at destination in Yangshuo; though this was 2 hours longer than scheduled as we had to wait on arrival at Guilin Airport on arrival on a team member arriving on a delayed flight from Taipei. Transit and waiting times added to the overall duration. As I write this blog I am flying at 30,000 ft altitude on my way back from Shanghai to Singapore after another long nearly 4 hour transit time at the lounge earlier on. With the poor internet catching up on emails it was kind of a challenge there, but I got some work done. Now comfortable seated I can work on some fee proposals and finalise my presentation for next week’s event in Abu Dhabi. I will upload the blog over the weekend in the peace and comfort of home…
Airlines
Travelling is more or less inherent to our profession, at least in my case, with my projects located in and around Asia Pacific, which means a lot of travel. Only a very small part of my projects are in Singapore or Australia, my two adopted home countries and hence I find myself in a plane nearly every week. The “trick” when travelling is of course to take the shortest, fastest and safest route, but that is easier said than done. Singapore Airlines is my airline of choice and I have flown with them for more than 25 years and both the airline and Changi Airport have consistently been at the top as one of the best in the world. Operating out of Singapore this makes sense as the airline and its partners have an outreach to practically every major destination in the world. Sometimes however clients chose for you and you travel with “different” airlines. In this case China Eastern…it is not difficult to see why SQ economy class is about the same price as China Eastern business….
With the different airline alliances finding connecting partner airlines that provide smooth timing and connections are sometimes a big challenge. Luckily our travel expenses are generally separately reimbursable so once we have the travel request approved the costs responsibility is shifted to the client. The more you travel you more you appreciate the comfort and not surprisingly as principal of the company most of my travels today are business class avoiding budget airlines as much as I can.
Projects and Time zones
For a long time I have adapted the strategy to have my projects in the North-South axis with Shanghai in the north, Singapore in the middle, Perth in the South, Mumbai in the west and Manilla in the East as this keeps my activities more or less in the same time zone. However lately with the shifting economies, project locations seem to shift as well projects now pushed out as far the Africa, Middle East and Eastern Europe to the West and New Zealand and Polynesia to the East. This brings the added challenge of flights, flight connections (as direct flights are becoming more difficult), flight duration and time zone differences. Keeping up with the office during the trips is also more complicated because of the longer flights and time differences. Having a great team to back you up is essential and I am blessed with my team allowing me to go out there while making sure our clients remain fully satisfied with our support.
The week that was
It seem fitting to end this week with the red, white and blue lighting tribute to the Paris attacks that have appeared on landmark buildings around the globe in support of France; something that somehow sadly would not have been possible a few years ago if not for LED technology. While I applaud the tributes and outpouring of support I say sadly as it also exposes the fact that every landmark today for some reason has succumbed to the need to install RGB LED illumination, something that for 90% surely is driven by the Cowboy-esque approaches from the local manufacturers and suppliers. Cities who now cannot illuminate their treasures in RGB lighting are being regarded (and made to feel embarrassed) as, stingy, not going with the times and trends. When I looked at the amount of well-known landmark buildings lit in RGB (including Rio the Janeiro’s Christ statue and Jerusalem’s wall …really?) I was astounded…I had no idea that LED had penetrated so deeply and on landmarks that in my opinion do not need any of this and for some reason that scares me. Only a very few seem to have a temporary lighting projection installation (Brandenburg Gate in Berlin), but do we really need a world where at the flick of a switch we can turn the lighting into any random colour?
Here are some famous and some random images of buildings and city sites. I leave you to identify the landmarks…have a great weekend.
The week that was…9-13th November
Perth, Weekend 14-15 November 2015;
Lighting design- the world tomorrow
The goings are getting slower and quite honestly with all my travel and other interests, my blogging is suffering, you may have noticed…I started my blog 6 years ago while attending PLDC in Berlin and with PLDC Rome just behind us and Xmas just around the corner it seems a good moment to take a break. I woke up this morning to the terrible events that unfolded in Paris last night which just reminds us all what world we are practicing our profession these days. With half my family living in Paris (thank god so far no-one seems affected) and Paris being one of my “home towns” these events bring us back to the harsh realities of this world with Charlie Hebdo still fresh in our minds…
Rather than giving you a day by day account of my life as a lighting designer, perhaps from now on in my weekly review I can tackle subjects that affects or relate to our profession in general. Here we go:
The world is changing
Over the coming weeks I will subsequently travel to China, Dubai, Tahiti, India, Malaysia and Indonesia with Vietnam and the Philippines knocking on my door to for project meetings before Xmas. While I am not changing my schedules because of these events, it does make you more vigilant and attentive to what happens around you and where you go…The aim of these terrorists, as the name already implies, is to create fear and terror in people’s minds, so giving in is virtually conceding victory to them.
It is amidst this world background that we have to keep focused on do our job and luckily this part of the world (Asia Pacific), seems relatively spared and “quiet”. It also relativises all the progress made in lighting technology and lighting design. With all the innovations and advances made, with all the potentials ahead it becomes rather trivial when the world crumbles down around you. As I am preparing my presentation paper for my upcoming guest speaking engagement in Dubai in 10 days’ time, I dug into the latest lighting and lighting design developments in support of my chosen subject of Smart Lighting Design. What is the future of lighting and lighting design and how smart is it?
From a waste economy
Of course there are the smart sensor systems that adapt the lighting to needs, where and when. But to me that is not really smart that is just another “gimmick” to further sales of products and systems. It is an economy model that is build around making, taking and wasting when the product or system has reached end of life (or more precisely has a critical component failing to work). Famously lamp manufacturers came together in the early part of last century to agree to limit incandescent lamp life to only 1000 hours after technological improvements had improved life from the initial 1500 hours to 2500 hours. It created fear of an oversaturated market where lamps could not be sold anymore…so lamps then were designed to fail. Today practically every product (lights specifically) are designed to fail (hence the limited warranty periods to “suit”). Initially the LED’s came out with a 100,000 hours lifespan claim, but that quickly changed to 50 or even 25,000 hours. Even worse, to compensate the longer LED life span LED fixtures are now designed such that you have to replace the WHOLE fitting even if one little component (usually the driver) fails. This is typical of the economic waste model that has the end user bear all the responsibility and costs while the manufacturer goes scot-free, earning money on the back of the consumer, creating waste our resources and pollutioning our environment in the process. It is time to rethink this…
To a circular economy
Some of you may have read about the latest initiatives where lighting is no longer sold as a product but as a service. The future is where you don’t buy a lamp, you buy lighting. Several schemes are in the process of development at the moment with the Philips “Pay per Lux” scheme probably the most well-known. While Philips cleverly is marketing this concept as being the innovators, my understanding is that it did not originate from Philips at all but that they were asked and suggested by environmental architects in Holland notably, with Philips only reluctantly agreeable to “look into it” and research the potential of the concept. The idea is that the manufacturer keeps full ownership of the lighting installation and the end user just pays for the light (lux) that it is using, a sort of monthly subscription with a predetermined contract period. Electricity bills are for the manufacturer as are any maintenance or repairs. At the end of the contract the manufacturer takes back the lighting installation with the idea to either re-use, repair, refurbish or recycle the materials and so creating a circular economy. The concept is a win-win for everybody; the user gets state of the art products and systems as it is in the manufacturer’s interest to minimise its costs which is only achieved by the best lighting performance, lowest energy consumption and longest life span. As an end user you don’t have to worry anymore, you have the amount of light where and when you want at a minimal capital outlay. Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport is currently pioneering the concept where the airport renovation has come with a “pay per lux” scheme for the next 15 years. Philips has taken full responsibility to provide the lighting installation (of course in coordination with the architects and interior designers) and the airport pays a pre-agreed monthly fee for a worry free up to standards lighting installation. There is another underlying thought to this concept and that is that the materials remain in possession of the manufacturer prompting and stimulating them to be innovative right from the product design stages in creating products, materials and components that are demountable, re-useable, and recyclable after usage protecting our environment and nursing the scarce resources of our planet in the process. Now that seems smart lighting design and we need to start integrating thinking that way as well!
Have a great weekend
The week of PLDC in Rome…28-31st October
PLDC 28th – 31st October 2015
Rather than doing a day by day account I will do a subject account so I can give you a general feedback of my experiences and appreciations of the various events throughout the convention. As many events and presentations are held in parallel I obviously had to make a choice, hence my report is an individual and subjective personal review rather than a comprehensive and complete summary of all the happenings and events.
The excursions – House of Augusto and Livia/ Termes di Diocleziano – ancient Rome
Prior to the official start of the convention there were several excursions organised and I was torn between the Sistine Chapel and the visit of the newly renovated Houses of Augusto and Livia in ancient Rome followed with a visit to de Termes di Diocleziano that included a network buffet dinner. I chose for the latter with the plan to do the Sistine Chapel at a second round; however that plan backfired due to over commitment, but nevertheless I fully enjoyed my choice of the day, despite the initial rain. The houses of the emperors Augusto and Livia had been renovated (covered with a roof for protection) and provided with a well-researched lighting. It is quite imposing to see these century old building footprints that reveal bits and pieces of how they lived at the time. More impressive is the thought that all murals and interior work would have been done at the time with limited daylight and candle light as source. Viewing it all now in bright (but well-controlled) LED lighting is quite a contrast but nevertheless awe-inspiring. The Termes were even more amazing…as part of the reconstitution of these old baths, the project team put together an animated reproduction on how it would have been looking like way back in the Roman days…the new lighting beautifully shows of the stone structures and footprints of where the baths used to be…The buffer dinner in the old cloister courtyard surrounded by ancient roman sculptures as a fitting end to the tour that was gracefully sponsored by Linea Light.
Key note speakers
The format of the convention revolves around keynote speakers that start of each half day session with a short key note speech traditionally a view on lighting from a non-lighting designers perspective. Keynote speakers in the past have been architects, artists, innovators and researchers, government or other authority representatives providing their professional and motivational view on what lighting means to them. It has provided some memorable experiences and this year was no different and I made a point of attending all of them. The first day key notes were kicked off by Dr Arnold Nesselrath, a professor with lots of historic and art and archaeological experience followed in the afternoon by architect Riccardo Marini, both providing us with interesting outsiders looks on the role of lighting in art and architecture. One of the eye-catching key notes came on day 2 from Klaus Obermaier, renowned visual and media artist. His experience in multi media productions was a stimulating look at the world of lighting from an artist point of view. His body stunning body movement projections were truly amazing…very inspirational. Key note speakers Daniel Latorre, a digital media and community expert, and Italian architect Michele Mole rounded up the convention on day 3…it was a good selection of speakers. The time-lapse photo’s from the room filling itself with the audience is self explanatory…
Presentations
It is impossible to go through all the many presentations in the 4 main categories presented to us; lighting application research, lighting design case studies, light and culture and professional practice issues. Each of the categories had interesting speakers and interesting subjects. As always there were good subjects with bad speakers and less relevant content presentations from good speakers…the age old dilemma for every organiser. But overall it was a good program. By far the most intriguing and fascinating presentation was the sound of colours by Neil Harbisson, to my knowledge the world’s first official cyborg with his implanted third eye antenna that senses colour and transfers these by means of vibrations to is brains. The implanted blue-tooth and internet connection in his head only adds to the imagination. Having been born totally blind he found a connection through sound and music to “materialise” colours in his life. I can only encourage anyone who is not aware of his exploits to google him. There is a YouTube TED-Talk that contains much of what he presented at the convention. Anne Bureaux’s presentation about life (and lighting) on Mars provide some much needed comic relief and while presentations by “routiniers” like Paul Traynor, Tapio Rosenius and Roger Narboni provided good, solid and interesting information, one can reflect that perhaps in the next PLDC they could leave the floor to some new generation speakers. Interesting talks were also provided by typically Rome and Italy related local subjects like the lighting of Da Vinci’s Last Supper, the renovation of the Houses of Augusto and Livia and the planned lighting upgrade for the Colosseum. All in all a lot to take in and take home…
Manufacturers exhibition
The sponsors of the event are all given a space to promote their latest products and interact with the tsunami of lighting designers that are all congregated together…the exhibitor venue was also the ideal location to catch up with friends have a coffee and meet during the lunch breaks. Many had new products to show, underlining the importance of the event.
Experience Rooms
A very interesting and successful part of the convention were the experience rooms. A variety of subjects were demonstrated in these rooms from colour therapy, daylight studies including a bit of lighting history courtesy of the Regiani museum who graciously made some of the “historical” lights available for a closer look. To allow us to take a closer look at the lights we were given perforated glasses to screen out the brightness…I certainly enjoyed the experience rooms. To be continued!
Moderated discussions
I only attended the last one on day 3 but found the discussions in which everyone could participate in a sort of round the table discussion interesting and more intimate due to the small size of the group…discussions of course also took place during lunch breaks and other “food” occasions”…
The Parties No PLDC is complete and this time around there were again parties galore. Mostly organised by the leading sponsors the choice was not easy! Parties by IGuzzini, Osram, Erco, Xicato, Flos and probably others I missed provided for the badly needed relaxation after a long day of conferencing. My favourite has to be the memorable Vespa scooter tour organised by IGuzzini on Friday; about 100 of us on scooters racing through Rome at night…it was mayhem, it was fun. Thanks to traffic assistant we all made it safely to dinner which was organised in historic Fendi House. The Xicato Haloween party afterwards had its usual quirkiness…
The Gala diner finale Not much need to be said about the traditional grand finale, the Gala diner and recognition awards night, held at the famous site of the Cinecitta film studios. The film studios have been the venue for famous movies such as Cleopatra, Romeo and Julliet, being Frederico Fellini’s preferred hunting ground. Most recently of all the latest Bond movie Spectre has been filmed in part here. The outdoor set of the TV series “Rome” provided a stunning back drop for the arrival drinks. Inside Kurt Vermeulen had turned the studio hall were more than 800 of us found a seat for diner in a magical candle lit event…memorable for sure. The party concluded with the announcement of the next PLDC: –> PLDC 2017 will be in Paris – Shift happens
See you there!
The week that was 27-28th October
Europe-post PLDC, 2nd November 2015
Note: due to the travelling and full on PLDC program my blog posting has been messed up a bit…apologies to my regular readers. J.It was again an event of very high standing and I have just arrived back in Holland for a little R&R with my parents before heading back to Singapore. While I sort through all the PLDC materials I collected over the last few days, I am posting some pictures of my Bali trip villa mock up room review and the beautiful autumn moods that are so typical in Europe. I will upload the PLDC stories and images in the next day or so.
Monday 27th October, Bali – Ubud
I arrived in my beloved Ubud yesterday to review the mock up villa in a high end resort that we are illuminating just on the outskirts of Ubud. The resort is nestled on the steep slopes of the river with stunning the rice paddy fields on one side and the deep river valley on the other. There is something special about Ubud…I am not sure what it is about Ubud but there is an air of peace and serenity that is very hard to describe…the deep winding river, the sounds of nature (the birds and the water rapids), the landscape, the rice fields, the artist communities, it all contributes to a very special feeling that makes this place special. No surprise I am therefore thrilled to have a project here, even more…that I can travel here regularly!
We have now reached the first project stage, which is the completion of the mock up villa…this 3-bedroom villa is the first expression and fruit of the design qualities of the project team and not surprisingly we were all anxious to see how it had turned out. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised. The interior design had come out really well with much attention to styling and detail and besides some minor lighting issues (your typical cove lighting installation issues) it looked really good for a first go! The review was constructive with mostly obvious changes and modifications needed. I was pleased to see these first lighting results and it’s blending in with the interiors. Also the outdoors (with some slight tweaking will look great. This is very promising for the rest of the project! Here are some mood images…
Tuesday 28th October, Holland – Beautiful autumn light
After a long overnight flight to Amsterdam on my way to Rome, I made a short one day transit stop in my home town of Haarlem in Holland to allow for a paced adaptation to the new time zone and cooler climate. While I used my time to write my site review report and catch up on some work emails, I also took the opportunity to get out for a walk to enjoy the beautiful autumn that created some breath-taking sights. It once again re-enforced the beauty of nature and how much light, natural daylight, impacts on our daily lives. The interaction between the sun and our natural environment, specifically the trees with their leaves turning into their autumn colours never fails to create some awesome and inspiring magic. A perfect “entrée” for the next couple of days at the PLDC in Rome…coming up in a separate blog post after this…
The week that was 19-23 October
Singapore- Bali, weekend 24-25th October 2015
Monday 19th October, Istanbul – Wrapping up
One last wrap up meeting with the team before flying back to Singapore. It has been a very intense couple of days in which we covered a lot of ground. Personally I relish these kind of workshops as we get to literally design face to face and in tandem with the lead designers of each team, decisions are made on the spot (no such thing as: “let me check with the boss”) as we are all here. In these few days we had several workshops on various areas still outstanding in terms of final design…as we wrap up the meetings we set out a time table for the follow up required from each of the teams…I have a satisfied feeling of having achieved a lot. Not only that…I also took time out on two of the nights to actually walk the site to experience it with practically no lights yet installed. As we have taken over the job from a previous lighting designer we have inherited parts of the previous design, including some hideous outdoor pathway bollards which had been installed along a section of the landscape. Many lighting designers may not take the opportunity to walk a site at night before actually starting the design but to me if possible it is an opportunity not to be missed. It provides you with the pure night time environment before the development is started or completed. In this particular case it showed us that even a 45min boat ride away from mainland there is still a lot of environmental spill light (call it light pollution if you want!) allowing you to walk around on the site at night without even needing a torch! It was surprising to all to discover how much light there still was late at night. Against that back drop, it was clear that the little pathway lighting section that had already been installed was way too much! Below some night time impressions from Istanbul our night time boat ride and actual site.
Tuesday 20th October, Istanbul- Singapore – Water submersion and drain tests
After an overnight flight back from Istanbul I arrive in the early hours of the morning back in Singapore…I take some additional hours sleep on arrival, but find myself back in the office in the afternoon to catch up with the team and discuss the follow required to my Istanbul trip. Despite the time difference I feel reasonably well (the few extra hours sleep helped) and I am keeping up well. The few days I have in the office this week will be usurped rapidly by project meetings and preparations for my other travels ahead.
As I work through my emails I come across a video sent from one of our project sites where the contractor had been requested by our team to do the water test on in-ground luminaires to make sure the water drains away properly after a water submersion like the ones that can be caused by a heavy down pour. The 30min test should allow us to see that water drains away properly and that lights have been properly installed, protected and still working after the submersion. The test can be carried out a few times. In our case it seemed to be ok thought the drain-time was on the slow side. It is a test often overlooked on installation but one that should be done always to assure that it has been properly installed…it is not something you want to discover when the installation is completed!
Wednesday 21st October, Singapore – Hoops and bounds
Most of the time we respond to RFP’s with straight forward proposals, but sometimes the client (generally big multi corporations or government authorities) have centimetre thick sub mission documents that you need to go through full of terms and conditions and request the shirt of your body in terms of submission details. Coincidently we have 3 of these projects we need to respond to this week with one of the submission requirements document nearly 400 pages to read through…@#$%! The long and short of these documents is that they want you to commit your life at a fixed lump sum fee with no escape to any additional or extra costs. For a project that is likely to take 3-5 years with another minimum 12 months defect and liability commitment, it is a long time. Most of the time there is no fixed time schedule making the commitment even more difficult. Not only that…they also want to know everything about you what there is to know, your bank account, your share holder ship, your profit and loss statements, etc. while I can understand that for lead contractors that take on multi-million dollar contracts, but for small scale practices like ours this seems totally over the top and irrelevant. Important is that we have a proper business licence and registration with local tax authorities, that we are a solvent company with the manpower capacity to take on the job (obviously with the relevant experience and track record) and a professional indemnity insurance to cover for eventualities. In one of the submissions they even require us to commit and break down the hours and manpower per area and scope of work…of course at this early stage we don’t know and the problem is that once we put this in black and white they will hold us to it!…Very tricky…here is just page 1 of 3 of the contents only (modified and adapted for confidentiality reasons)…!
Thursday 22nd October, Jakarta – Inter disciplinary coordination
Today I am in Jakarta for the day to coordinate our lighting design coordination with the clients implementation team. Representatives from the various disciplines are all in attendance to hear our latest update and coordinate our requirements with their own needs. I am the lead consultant for lighting but as we are integrating the full stage lighting and infra-structure design as part of our scope for this multidisciplinary venue this coordination meeting is critical. We are targeting for the venue to be completed for the Miss Indonesia pageant next year February, so the time schedule is tight. Luckily there is a plan B in place in case we are not able to complete the project in time. There are so many unknowns still to be consolidated that it would be foolish to commit to completing this in time. In December we will take stock of our progress and if it looks like we can achieve it we will go for it if not there is an alternative venue available…at the end of the day we are all aligned and in consensus about what we want in terms of the lighting…what rest is the final presentation to the “big boss” and sign off on the budget for our design specifications!
During our lunch break we drop in on one of the live talent shows being recorded and broadcast as we visit. I always relish these opportunities as it shows us our client in action and the standards that they are used to work with. Good benchmark for us to improve on…
Friday 23rd October, Singapore – Wireless lighting technology
Today I had invited one of the leading companies in Singapore, providing wireless lighting solutions, Partex-Airstar. Besides their illuminated balloon business, one of the key products are rechargeable lights, some with over 12 hours continuous operation, with wireless controls. It is an increasingly popular technology that is finding more and more application specifically in the outdoor areas. While initially designed for events and functions these products are now finding their way in more permanent architectural applications and we are currently considering the use f some in our projects, hence the invitation to present the latest to our team today. The interesting part is that the lights are magnetic, in other words they can be clipped on to a metal base, being a building structure or other and because there are no wires there is ultimate flexibility. The controls are done through dedicated frequency controllers or through downloadable mobile phone apps. All lights are IP rated for outdoor use. The challenge now is to move from temporary event installations to permanent architectural installations. I am keen to see how that will develop. It is not difficult to see that the combination with renewable energy could loud a new area in outdoor façade and other (outdoor) lighting applications such as illuminated furniture!
Next week PLDC in Rome! I will report about that next weekend…but first a quick stop in Bali tomorrow and Monday for a project site review…
Have a great weekend ahead.
The week that was
The week that was 12-16 October
Istanbul, weekend 17-18th October 2015
Monday 12th October, Singapore – United front and team work One of the key factors of successful project work is team work. It seems a logical statement but in designers world we generally deal with lots of (big) ego’s and cooperative teamwork where cooperative teamwork is not necessarily on the menu. This means these designers just do their own high horse approach thing and expect others to take and deal with it. That may result in something good at the end but in my experience there are always casualties along the way. In my practice I make it a point that any design concept for instance is coordinated with the principal team members before we present anything to a client. This serves many purposes; first of all it shows the client that you are united in your approach as nothing is worse in my opinion then presenting your concept and getting questioned by your own project team members in front of your client! But also towards your fellow designers and operator if involved, it shows respect and cooperation to value their design intents as well. Today I had initiated such meeting in Singapore and I felt it helped very much create a bonding between us, but most of all I left the meeting knowing that I had their full support for our proposed lighting design concept.
Tuesday 13th October, Singapore – Catching up A large part of developing a successful practice revolves around relationships; you never know where your next project may come from, so maintaining your relationships on all levels and cross borders is crucial. In the same spirit I hardly ever close my door on manufacturers who want to visit me or catch up with my team. They are not just “suppliers” they are the providers of the lifeline of our work; the products we specify! Keeping up with the latest innovations is elementary and good relationships make good friends and with that potentially new contacts and business opportunities. In between project preparation work for my upcoming trips to Vietnam and Turkey later in the week I made time to catch up with an unscheduled visitor today, a supplier from another country who happened to be in Singapore. We have and are working on some projects. Not planned, not scheduled this spontaneous catch up turned out nice not only for catching up with each other but also for the potential new projects that came out of our discussions!
Wednesday 14th October, Singapore – HCMC, Vietnam – Reviewing your competitor It does not happen often but when it does it is always an opportunity to be taken with both hands. The operator from one of my projects was handed lighting design specifications from one of my overseas competitors on another project and felt highly uncomfortable with what he saw. Concerned about how his hotel was going to look like he asked me to review and give me his opinion. This is not uncommon and for all I know mine may have been given to others to review, who knows. To me it shows my operators confidence in my services and our professional approach to lighting and in return offers me the opportunity to see how some of my competitors go about their job. After reviewing I could understand the operators concern…the specification looked like it had been put together by a local supplier and in all eventuality it probably was. Generic descriptions without specific performance or quality data with by the looks of it a non-descript picture of a fitting that could be from anywhere. In short the specification left the door wide open for any type of interpretation. I was shocked to see it and don’t understand how a lighting design practice can get away with that! It strengthened my belief that we are doing a professional job, but it left me wondering how these kind of “lighting design” practices get appointed in the first place!
Thursday 15th October, HCMC, Vietnam – Staying out of the blame game? After arriving in HCMC late last night, we are in meetings all day today with a full consultant’s team in attendance. We were first of the hook with our presentation (thank god!) and presented to a fresh and expecting crowd. We had the chance that the actual big boss himself was present, a rare occasion as he generally leaves it to his team. As he only speaks Vietnamese my presentation had to be translated along the way, but from his approving nods I could see he liked what he saw. At the end his translator confirmed that but impressed that he wanted to make sure my lighting design was conform the high end Starwood standards, but that I had to achieve that at the lowest possible budget! Where have I heard that before. The reason I was happy to kick off the meeting is because the “real” meeting was going to be a multiple cat fight between client, project manager, lead consultant and hotel operator. It had appeared that the PM had only recently properly looked at the drawing and discovered that the minimum facilities area as required by the operator in terms of GFA where way less then the designed GFA by the lead consultant. Of course the facilities program form the operator are net areas and do not include connecting corridors and outdoor balconies and the like. But the cost of the project ultimately is determined by the actual built up areas. It now seemed that the client had based its financing on the net areas only and now confronted by the reality of nearly double the costs was looking to blame the lead consultant. Of course they had the area figures all along and where updated time again about design changes, but for some reason never had properly looked at it. “Discovering” this at this stage (we are about to move in construction phase) is a bit late in the piece and we can only suspect that the PM never really looked at it or even shared it with the owner. Now to save face we found ourselves in a battle royal most of the day where each was trying to blame the other. This time I was happy to be a bystander and most of all that I had been able to present and get my concept approved before moods soured.
Friday 16th October, Istanbul – Jet-setting After a 3 hour transit in Singapore last night I have landed in Istanbul for a 4 day design workshop for another project here. On arrival we transited to the Kabetas pier were we hopped on the owners motor yacht to make the 1 hour journey by boat to the island site. Life a s a designer is certainly varied and multi-facetted, where you can be in one place one day and half way around the globe the next. This is one of the projects I am really enjoying as the team is professional and respectful and a delight to work with. Not only that they take care of you to the smallest detail and in the process make you feel comfortable and motivated to do a good job. On arrival we dived straight into our meetings, the first of 4 days of intensive design workshops which will take us all the way to Monday. We did our presentations, created many lighting design sketches and overall had a very creative day.
More next week…I got work to do, not sure when I will have time to upload the blog 🙂
Have a great weekend ahead.
The week that was
The week that was October 5-9
Singapore, weekend 10-11th October 2015
Monday 5th October, Muscat, Oman – New Horizons, new relationships
I find myself waking up in the Grand Hyatt in Muscat after having arrived last night from Singapore. A new project, and new horizons for me as it is my first time in Oman. Our project is actually a hotel resort in Salalah, another 1-2 hours flying further south but the kick-off meeting for us is held in the architect’s office just across the road from our hotel. I attach great importance to these kick-off meetings where you meet the client and the project team for a first time. This is where you can set the tone and cement the basis for a successful partnership in a project. First impressions are crucial in life and hence we generally come out well prepared with the aim to put the client and the team at ease that they made a good decision in appointing us. It is important to set the tone for this new relationship right from the start, explaining what they can expect from us in terms of deliverables, agreeing on time schedules and showing our capabilities and expertise through a presentation in which we share our first thoughts in regards to the lighting design concept for this project. While you may argue the usefulness of a 3 day trip for a 3 hour meeting, nothing in my opinion beats a first face to face meeting with the team you are going to work with over the next 1-2 years or so. Judging by the reactions we are off to a great start and we are looking forward to working with this team.
We made use of our time in Muscat to do a bit of reconnaissance by visiting some of the top hotels at the end of the day. Always good to get up to speed with the local standards and see what has been done before you! We visited the Shangri-la, the Ritz-Carlton and The Chedi, who are supposed to be the trending top hotels. With our own Grand Hyatt experience we came away with renewed energy to work on this project. Specifically The Chedi was relevant and inspirational. See pictures below.
Tuesday 6th October, Muscat-Dubai-Singapore – Travel time and solar developments
Today was a full day of travelling hopping on an very early morning flight to Dubai for our transit to Singapore. It is generally not the most productive time as a lot goes in the transiting, waiting, checking-in, security clearance, immigration, lounging, and so on. Trying to work or read on the plane is not as efficient, though the fact that you can’t be disturbed by emails or calls does help to focus. Though even that is gradually becoming a thing of the past with internet-WiFi and calls now possible on many flights. I still dutifully switch everything off enjoying my me-time, reading up on things, writing my minutes or reports or just simply clearing some other stuff from my to-do list. During the 3-hour transit in Dubai I had managed to work through my emails and clear out some pressing issues and down loading some stuff for during the flight. As this was a daytime flight I mostly worked, interrupted by supplies of coffee and food.
Besides clearing my work back log I also got to read up about another “clearing” matter. Some researchers have now managed to develop a clear glass solar panel and while that seems an oxymoron (glass is supposed to let light through, not absorb it!) it somehow works. To my understanding they integrated crystals in the glass that “diverts” parts of the light, most particularly the non-visible light waves such as infrared and ultraviolet, to the edge of the glass panel where “strip size solar cells” capture the light and transforms it into solar energy. While the efficiency of this technology is yet to be proven, it seems to have a great potential and further move us to a world of rechargeable energy.
Wednesday 7th October, Singapore – Fire alarm
By far the most unique lighting experience as a lighting designer happened in our Palace Hotel project in Perth today. As part of the interior design concept we have refitted some original heritage statuettes depicting a man holding a flame with new hand-blown glass to re-introduce the actual flame experience. The amazing thing that happened that when the flame lights were switched on the fire alarm went off! Thinking it was a coincidence the lights and fore alarm were switched of and our lights switched on again, but the same thing happened…the fire alarm went off again. While there is obviously an electrical coincidence at work, it was quite comical that our artificial fire light would trigger the fire alarm…just shows you how realistic our designs are! One for the history books!… PS: The flames are photo-shopped into the picture as I don’t have the site photo yet
Thursday 8th October, Singapore – LED binning and budgets
One of the key issues in our design process is the selection of the light fittings and with that the definition of the quality of the LED technology. Centre to this is the colour quality of the LED lighting and the binning quality relating to the production process. Time and again we are faced with on-site discoveries of colour inconsistencies due to colour temperature variations and time and again we scratch our heads on how that managed to scrape through again. In one of our projects this became glaringly obvious when LED linear lights that are used to backlight a fabric white stretch ceiling clearly showed colour differences throughout the large surface. While we did specify the colour temperature and the binning tolerance, the contractor had to value engineer the whole ceiling and may have taken some short cuts in the process. With the installation now completed and the stretched ceiling installed, the impact only becomes visible. While we offered different causes to the client like different electrical supply to some of the panels, varying dimming signals possibly causing different outputs, potential internal reflections and material differences in quality, the most likely cause from our observation is that we are dealing with different batches of LED’s. while we can’t really change the lighting at this point in time as the ceiling is all sealed up, we do have a lesson learned for the future in educating the client about the risks of “cheaper” (low binning tolerance) LED selections. With reference to the MacAdam ellipses who define steps within the CIE 1931 colour diagram in regards to colour consistency, a 1-step MacAdam ellips defines a zone of 2 degrees colour space within which the human eye cannot see a colour difference. As a guideline David MAcAdam listed the visual sensitivities to colour differences, which I think we should use in educating our client about the potential inconsistencies that can be encountered in our finished projects.
This is his findings for a typical CCT of 3000K: 1-step: +/- 30K; 2-step: +/- 60K; 4-step: +/- 100K; 7-8-step: +/- 175K. It is obvious from these steps that LED binning from 4 to 8 steps create CCT differences of up to 175K either way! For good colour consistency 1 or perhaps 2 steps can be recommended, some applications even up to 4, but anything above should be avoided! Below site and measurements we made; up to 300K difference!
Friday 9th October, Singapore – Maintenance hoops
Today I went to see a client with a big auditorium that is in need of refurbishment. Always good to take stock of the site before you actually come up with a fee proposal I went “on location” to assess the current state and the work required to bring it up to standards and desired lighting performances and effects. Since the theatre had catwalks up in the ceiling I went up (always up for a bit of exercise J) and had a good look into the ceiling and existing lighting. Besides the fact (not to my surprise) that I saw a ceiling cove with fluorescent lights pretty much condemned and useless, I did find a pulley system for the maintenance of the lights. All down lights were actually hung above the ceiling and could be pulled up for lamp replacement and then lowered back above the ceiling hole. This “vintage” installation was developed to avoid having to service the ghts (mostly PAR56 and high wattage CFL’s) from the ground (about 10-12m up) making use of the catwalk system that was there anyhow. I remember these installations from 20 years ago when it was quite common but I have never applied this in my own designs for a very long time! It looks pretty amateurish and not surprisingly many of the lights I saw were not really hang centred let alone vertically! There is definitely work to do here…let’s see if I can entice this client with an attractive fee proposal, looks like a neat little challenge project!
Have a great weekend
The week that was
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