LUCE estratti LUCE 319_Longo, Rizzato Naressi_Piano nobile di lu | Page 9

Is this the sole light source in such
a large space?
No, since the musicians need up to a thousand
lux on their seats to read their notes. There is a
large suspended element in the middle, which
is a great acoustic reflector. There are lights on
its top that illuminate the vault from above,
avoiding the dark hole effect. The stage lighting
is installed on its underside. There are theatre-
like luminaires, whose spotlights can be
directed to generate much more light on stage.
More stage lighting comes from a circular
opening in the ceiling that discretely conceals
the headlights.
You also designed the lighting project for the
new Theatre and Recital Hall of the Royal
Academy of Music in London, which will be
opened at the end of this year. What are the
peculiarities of a lighting design for cultural
spaces?
London was a very nice experience. Ian Ritchie
Architects Ltd was invited by the Royal Academy
of Music – part of the University of London and
one of the top conservatoires in the world – to
refurbish the existing Theatre and to enlarge the
Recital Hall. For me it is fantastic when a
building is refurbished because you can see how
people live in it. While I walked through the
construction site, I could hear the music
exercises of the young people in the rehearsal
rooms. What I also liked was the Londoner
architect’s idea about the interiors: they are
cladded with wood, like most stringed
instruments are made from wood. We wanted
the light of a traditional chandelier to be spread
all around the hall. So we redesigned its
classical crystals and positioned them on the
entire ceiling and along the walls.
subjects together and not split in three different
aspects. They learn to look at the budget since
the very beginning and to talk with the client
in terms of quality and costs, thus providing
a good final consultancy.
Going back to the Elbphilharmonie, why have
the real costs been re-estimated more than once
and so much?
There have been different reasons why it costed
much more than expected. One aspect concerns
the contracts, the other that it took too long
to complete the whole construction. However,
it did not cost that much from the lighting point
of view, as I am very structured in this sense,
as I teach in my workshops.
Has being a woman influenced your career?
When I started to work as a lighting designer
thirty years ago, there were very few lighting
design practices headed by women.
At the beginning, electrical engineers used
to test if I were able to deal with technical
issues: they wanted to see if I could answer
their questions or if I was competent.
Now the situation has changed a little bit,
there are more women-owned businesses.
At first, a woman has to do a bit more
to be fully accepted, but then, I think, there
is no difference.
Lighting the city: you wrote a book about this
topic. Which kind of innovations and what new
concepts will we see in the upcoming future?
When a city has beautiful buildings and a nice
urban context, it is a good thing to show them,
without overdoing. Many cities have a jungle of
different types of luminaires, which is also very
expensive in terms of maintenance. Fortunately,
cities are nowadays much more aware of the fact
that they need a lighting concept to deal with
this aesthetic concern. Sure, we have technical
innovations, and today we can control new light
sources more than we could ten years ago.
Street and highway lighting is dimmable, with
less energy consumption and a lower impact
on the environment. Darkness is very important:
the more lighting we put, the smaller the eyes
pupil becomes. Thus, even if it is brighter, our
sight does not improve. It is infinitely preferable
to use less lighting, so that pupils are wider
and the eyes more open, registering more things.
In Hamburg, for example, the street lighting
provides only half of the amount of light
expected by the standards defined after the 1970s
oil crisis. In each luminaire two lamps were
installed, of which one is now kept switched off.
The average illumination is much lower than
the standard, but nonetheless the number
of car accidents has remained unchanged
over time and it works perfectly.
details. We wanted an illumination underneath
the ceiling that would partially light up
the ceiling itself. If we had put a recessed
downlights, the ceiling would not have been
illuminated, while in our proposal the glass
balls allow the right portion of light is reflected
back to the ceiling. The technical system is
located above these glass balls, and in the
ceiling itself there is a kind of downlight, with
dimmable LED sources that give this pleasant
warm glow within the glass lamps.
Zapf
You are the founder of the Brandi Institute of
Light and Design. Why did you feel the need to
support training in this discipline?
I have my own idea of learning how to become
a lighting designer. I have always considered
the importance of bringing together the
aesthetic and the technical knowledge of light,
integrating the observation and the
understanding of the different phenomena that
light can create into a specific know-how. Both
in planning and building phase, artists and
technicians have quite often difficulties. We
must have both competence and acquire these
skills at the same time. Within the architectural
lighting design profession you work within a big
group of people from different backgrounds. You
must communicate in a structured way – being
able to estimate costs, for instance. In my
workshops I analyse these matters in a one
week or a three days session, and I see how
enthusiastic young people are to learn all these
CORRESPONDENCE FROM BERLIN / LUCE 319
55