Published on: October 14, 2009

Maurice Brill Lighting Design from London sent us this recently completed project. Refurbished atrium of the office building on Houndsditch street in London needed a lighting design that would accentuate the new design.

(Above photos by Rob Honeywill)

Here’s more from MBLD :

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This 1980’s London City office was an outdated design in need of street presence and redesign. 133 Houndsditch is located between Liverpool Street and Aldgate in the City of London is flanked by two notable skyscraper sites, the Heron Tower at one end and the Minerva Tower at the other. The new building owners Henderson Global Investments and architects Swanke Hayden Connell Architects appointed MBLD to design and develop a fast track lighting design scheme within a few months for the public areas which included the main atrium.
With a reserved budget, both client and architect had clear understanding of what they wanted to achieve. Even with a modestly sized atrium existing spaces were dark and lack luster for staff and visitors.

(Photo by Rob Honeywill)

SHCA designed a strong black feature wall that would act like a signature ribbon, starting at the entrance, wrapping behind the reception and then ascending up into the atrium. Opposite to this is a rough texture limestone wall that wraps deep into the lift lobby at the rear of the reception.

(Photo by Tom Brill)

MBLD wanted the lighting to create a sense of space beyond space and draw people in and through to the lift lobby beyond and create a simple but strong change from day to night. This was achieved by focusing on the inclined black feature wall (nearly all of the walls are sloping) by using Light Projects/Lumascape 70w CDMT ground recessed uplighters to accent the wall form and texture, and then by night, the uplights are switched off and white LED edge lit blades mounted between the stone panels create an abstract which delineates the wall through into the atrium. The lighting change takes moves away from the form and defines space. All the LED blades were custom made by Public Screen to match the tile widths and each section had to be cut at different angles in order to create a parallel surface and match the walls mounting angle.

(Photo by Tom Brill)

The black wall was originally to be made of a mixture of timber and stone and the percentage mix would gradually change from one to the other, and we were to follow this idea with the light blades but this was later changed for a simple division of materials and keep the timber only as the back wall to the seating area.

(Photo by Tom Brill)

The opposite limestone wall wrapped around into the rear lift lobby and is the connecting material that crosses flat ceilings and the open atrium and so was important that the effect of grazing downlight appeared consistent. Custom made Mike Stoane Lighting 35w CDMAR111 wall mounted brushed stainless steel luminaries were used from the entrance position and then changed to MSL trimless downlights for the lift lobby area.

(Photo by Tom Brill)

Downlighting for the areas were kept to a minim as we wanted to keep the ceilings as clean as possible and so using ceiling slots at the entrance helped underscore the concept.
The reception desk is lit using Concord Marlin CDM-T Framing projectors from the second floor and focused to frame the desk and provide working light. The upper atrium terraces hide Sill 70w projectors that are used during the daytime to overcome the strong contrast that is created to a large solid ceiling section that sits in-between two glazed roofs.

(Photo by Rob Honeywill)

Finally, the lift lobbies are lit using full height stainless steel cold cathode light boxes mounted into the lift reveals by Neolec. These are linked (as was all the lighting) to the Lutron lighting control system and programmed to create much brighter levels of light for the morning which becomes less bright and warmer for late afternoon and evening.
Technically this raised challenges for Neolec as there was only a 90mm recess and we wanted a single piece of glass and the detailing of the frame had to be as neat and as simple as possible.

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Note of the editor:

Please note the copyright of these images is retained by Maurice Brill Lighting Design (MBLD) and the photographers Tom Brill and Rob Honeywill. Use of those images is subject to them being used for this article only.