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Buddakan, New York

Designer: Christian Liaigre / Gilles & Boissier

From inception this restaurant aimed to become ‘The’ destination to eat in New York. It was recognised that in fashionable destinations the act or arriving and of being seen are as important as the food that is served. It was on this basis that the interior and its lighting were very much seen as the set for a performance, a theatrical show. With a starring role as one of the sets in ‘Sex in the City’ you could say this has been achieved.

Felix at The Peninsula, Hong Kong

Designer: Philippe Stark

An iconic design from the end of the eighties, this restaurant and bar have become world famous as one of the prime places to visit in Hong Kong. Starck’s unrestrained originality has been copied many times around the world particularly for interiors for night-clubs and bars but this restaurant was the first with: whole areas lit from the floor, striation lighting to blinds, ripple effects to textured walls, glowing fabric walls. Visiting now the whole space looks as original as when it first opened.

Gramercy Park Hotel, New York

Designer: Julian Schnabel

Situated in the heart of the New York’s art world, Ian Schrager maintains his position of original style icon with a dramatic hotel of the like never seen before. Conceptual artist and filmmaker Julian Schnabel has described himself as a ‘reluctant decorator’, where each room houses large scale modern art but avoids a minimalist, gallery feel. The over-all effect of ‘Chic Hacienda’ is to be very traditional in a contemporary way.

Hakkasan, London

Designer: Christian Liaigre

Alan Yau is one of the restaurateurs that put London back on the map of international cuisine. With Hakkasan he has exploited low cost basement real estate and brought Christian Liaigre to transform its interior into the first Chinese restaurant in Britain to win a Michelin Star. As a basement space the lighting in many places has been recessed behind custom blue glass panels to simulate an open daylit feel to the perimeter. As a night-time space filled with black wooden screens we had to work very hard to maintain intimacy but keep enough light to the centres of the tables to read by.

Hotel Puerta America, Madrid

Designer: Foster, Hadid, Chipperfield, Newson, Liaigre, Pawson, Arad, Findlay, Nouvel

A unique and daring experiment where a single hotel used 14 of the most iconic and famous designers of the world to each create a unique space to the same brief, this hotel can barely be described as a single project. Almost as a competition each architect was well aware of the immediate comparison that each of their spaces would face and as such each have produced something original and iconic. With 14 unique styles to work within it was very important that the lighting quietly contributed to each in a very subtle manner so as to provide a sense of unity throughout all of the spaces.

Museum of Islamic Art, Doha

Designer: I. M. Pei and J M Wilmotte

The Emir of Qatar invited IM Pei to design for Qatar and the whole Islamic World a structure as immediate and startling as his Glass Pyramid for The Louvre. After 3 months of studying Islamic monuments throughout the 1000 year history of Islam Pei has produced a timeless masterpiece of pure architecture that is equally as contemporary as it is ancient in form ad inspiration. The collection is the Emir’s personal passion to establish Qatar as a centre of learning and culture within the Gulf region and as such he has amassed the single largest collection of the entirety of Islamic history. As a reflection of quality of the exhibits and the age and sensity of many of the Korans, the lighting system is fully computerized such that the light level, intensity and direction are all computer controlled and maintained.

The Double Club by Fondazione Prada, London

COURTESY: FONDAZIONE PRADA, MILAN

Every year Fondazione Prada invites a contemporary artist to design an installation throughout the summer and as such become an annual item on the Arts calendar. This year the temporary installation of Carsten Holler directly contrasts the richest and poorest of environments with a line down the middle of the space with one side being a bourgeois London Interior and other a night environment from the Republic of Congo. To bring together the best in high and low tech innovation whilst maintaining a comfortable environment was an exceptional challenge particularly as light recognises no physical boundary.

Sake No Hanna, London

Designer: Kengo Kuma Architects and Associates

With every restaurant that Alan Yau launches it is based on a culinary experience brought to London from another part of the world. With Sake No Hana Alan introduces the English to inland Japan. The traditional Japanese interior by Kengo Kuma was had assembled in Japan with local materials and joinery techniques before being dismantled and shipped. The installation had to be very sensitive to London’s first historically listed modern concrete building Smithson FT building: an Icon of London’s re-birth in 1950’s. The lighting had also to respect the historic interior and therefore each element was custom designed in order to be hidden in either type of finish. The finished effect is one of a glowing ambience but no perception of where the light is coming from.

Walker Arts Centre, Minneapolis

Designer: Herzog & de Meuron

The Walker Art Centre had gained an international reputation for cutting edge innovation in the arts where the mixing of creative disciplines had defined original works in each genre. The building which housed this did not reflect such innovation. The extension became a shimmering set of jewels which expressed this creative interaction between forms and functions through transparency and textures. The lighting throughout constantly responds to mood and sensitivity of the creative work inside and reflects the of intimacy to drama.

Ford Concept Car

Designer: Mark Newson

Ford Motor Company

The idea of this Concept Car was to re-think all aspects of how our everyday cares are used, the associated ergonomics and the latest current technologies. The ergonomic designs developed dramatic innovations such as chairs turning as per requirements, a rear trunk the slides out to meet the user and rear doors accessible from the front of the car. The lighting technique also changed beyond familiar recognition. The latest technologies in LEDs enabled increased levels of innovation such as a single glowing front to the car as a head-lamp, internal ceiling planes providing even shadow-less light to the interior.

St Martin’s Lane Hotel, London

Designer: Philippe Starck

With the opening of this hotel, a new type of boutique urban chic was created for London that after 10 years is still one of the most fashionable hotels in Europe. The central feature of this iconic interior is the Lighting, within each room the light either glows or changes according to choice of the occupant. A common feature of modern LED technologies but 10 years ago this required custom circuitry and lamp technologies. In all of the reception areas the lighting has also been made the central feature whether this be the central carpet (projected), the feature glass wall (image projection) or saturated colour walls where the coloured light merges with the reflections.

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