Light as a Spatial Condition
3 Light as a Spatial Condition
3.3 Extending Teichmüller’s Concepts by Linking them to the Scale of the Façade
Building on Luckardt and Köhler, who further develop Teichmüller’s concept of Architekturlicht by connecting it the scale of the city, in this section I will propose an additional extension by linking Architekturlicht and Lichtarchitektur to the scale of the façade. The aim is to discuss how different lighting technologies of façade illumination allowed new opportunities for architectural integration and façade illumination design, accentuating existing or constructing new temporal architectural qualities with light.
Emphasis is given to three different lighting technologies of façade illumination:
Incandescent lighting, floodlighting and high intensity lighting.
Incandescent Lighting
Until 1915, façade illumination used incandescent lighting technology and was characterised by an “outline technique”; i.e. lighting design focused on the illumination of the building’s outline, the outline of windows and other architectural effects, illuminating and emphasising existing qualities of the architecture. This technique usually transformed the buildings into “painterly designs” and visually increased their height, supporting the logics of “verticality as an organizing principle for the city” (Nye, 1992, p. 63–66).
Drawbacks to this technique were that the lighting sometimes had a “skeletal effect … burned out bulbs were distracting, and often [implied] glare” (Ackley, as cited in Palin, 2015). A characteristic building illuminated by this technique was the Singer Building (fig.35), which was New York’s tallest building in 1907, the lighting design for which was developed by the electrical engineer Luther Stieringer (Nye, 1992, p. 66).
Incandescent lighting technology enabled a design approach in which light was integrated into the façade’s spatial design by illuminating the outline of windows and other architectural effects. This design approach used a matrix of light points to outline and illuminate the building’s form, height and windows.
Bringing in this reference provides strength to my argument that Teichmüller’s concept of “Architekturlicht” allows additional extension, including the scale of
Light as a Spatial Condition
– 121 – To allow further development of the idea that different lighting technologies enabled different design approaches to the integration and use of light in façade illumination, I will now reflect on floodlighting.
Floodlighting
In 1915 the electrical engineer Walter D’Arcy Ryan introduced “floodlighting”
as a new approach to façade illumination at The Panama-Pacific International Exposition. Ryan stated (as cited in Plain, 2015): “contrary to general expecta-tion, there will be no outlining of the Panama-Pacific Exposition buildings with incandescent lamps”.
Floodlight allowed an “even illumination” of the building and a focus on the architecture, as lighting fixtures were separated from the architecture rather than being positioned on the façade. Another effect characteristic of Ryan’s designs were
“luminous shadows”, which entailed additional corner illumination to avoid dark spots. The building Tower of Jewels, shown in figure 37, displayed these principles at the exposition.
Advantages of this illumination technique as opposed to Stieringer’s technique were that buildings appeared more “three-dimensional” and “natural”.
A disadvantage was that it could also result in over-illumination of the building (Nye, 1992, p. 63–66).
By considering this approach towards façade illumination as Lichtarchitektur, I propose that not only the concept of Architekturlicht, but also the concept of Lichtarchitektur can be linked to the scale of the façade.
While incandescent lighting technology inspired Stieringer to develop an design approach characterised by a matrix of light points, allowing an effect that accentuated existing architectural qualities, floodlighting gave Ryan new design opportunities, enabling him to separate the light from the building and illuminate it from a distance and allowing him to extend the existing qualities and make the building appear more three-dimensional.
It also inspired him to combine floodlighting with effect lighting, using coloured filters or motors. The project Great Scintillator (fig. 39) is an example of this new design approach. Described as the exposition’s “splashiest illumination effect” and “fireless firework”, Great Scintillator consisted of floodlights with coloured filters and motors, allowing vertical and horizontal control of the light spots, as well as the control of colour (Plain, 2015).
astrid_phd_book_ISBN.indb 121 08/04/16 11.10
[35] Singer building, New York, 1908 – a characteristic example of façade illumination, using “outline techniques”
to emphasise existing qualities of the architecture and support its verticality (Image source: General Electric Company)
[35] [37]
[38]
[39]
[36]
Light as a Spatial Condition
– 123 – The lighting design of the project Great Scintillator goes beyond integration.
Rather than integrating the light, Ryan uses it to create appearing and disappearing spaces with light.
This design approach connects heterogeneous light effects to an idea of control that deals with effective space-making through the use of floodlights with coloured filters and motors, creating appearing and disappearing coloured light spaces by vertical and horizontal lines of light.
Adding this design approach to Teichmüller’s taxonomy allows an extension of Teichmüller’s concept of architecture in light as an effect-maker of temporal, varying spaces of light by bringing it back to public space and by introducing dy-namic, coloured light. While Teichmüller’s conception steers the effect of light by controlling its direction and intensity, Ryan increases the variety of lighting effects by using different colours of light and by suggesting an idea of light that is not static, but dynamic and controllable by the use of motors, allowing the direction of light to be changed so as to vary the illumination time.
High Intensity Lighting
The invention of “high intensity lights” enabled another new design approach that built on the design approach used in Tower of Jewels. Instead of utilising corner illuminations to increase the building’s three-dimensionality, the use of “high intensity lights” enabled the creation of “luminous shadows” as another effect to make the building and its architectural details, such as windows, appear more three-dimensional (fig.36). This was made possible by two technological advances:
Firstly, the improvement of reflectors increased their ability to reflect light through the use of ridged surfaces; and secondly, the use of a metallic coating reduced light absorption (Nye, 1992, p. 66).
Linking these three lighting technologies – incandescent lighting, flood lighting and high-intensity lighting – to Teichmüller’s taxonomy shows that they allowed the development of one approach towards Architeckturlicht by the development of the “outline technique” (incandescent lighting) and two approaches towards Lichtarchitektur by floodlighting and high intensity lighting.
Effect lighting additionally provided the means to extend Lichtarchitektur by linking it to different colours of light and by demonstrating an idea of light that is not static, but dynamic and controllable.
astrid_phd_book_ISBN.indb 123 08/04/16 11.10
Synopsis
In this section I have further developed the underlying conceptual framework for the understanding of light as a spatial condition by moving down in scale from the city to the façade and by allowing further development of Teichmüller’s concepts of Lichtarchitektur and Architekturlicht by linking them to the scale of the façade. This enabled me to discuss how new lighting technologies provide new opportunities for design, allowing new spatial agencies that can accentuate or extend the architecture’s existing spatial qualities, while also allowing new ones. In the discussion, I also elaborated on how control and the use of coloured, dynamic light can support the use of light as a spatial effect-maker.