Dieter Polle
Following the launch of DIAL’s new book, Smart Building Design - Conception, Planning, Realisation and Operation, arc caught up with Managing Director Dieter Polle to discuss Smart Lighting, and its role in the wider realm of building design.
How did you get into lighting?
I’ve been fascinated by light since I was a child. At university I was fascinated by these giant spheres and goniophotometers standing in all black rooms. I liked that lighting engineers focus on the interface to humans and that all the science is about improving the wellbeing of people in spaces. These interesting aspects came together with my passion for design and architecture, so what else could I do than become a lighting specialist?
Can you give me an overview of your career to date?
After my study of electrical engineering and lighting at university in Karlsruhe, I got my first professional experience at a mid-size design-orientated luminaire manufacturer as a lighting designer. After a short time an interesting offer came to me. DIAL was just founded and was looking for someone to design a photometric lab as well as a white lab. I took the chance. DIAL grew continuously, offering new challenges to me. We built an excellent lab and offered seminars to customers who wanted to learn about lighting. After some years I took over the position as a team leader of the lighting team. DIAL’s growth continued and I had the chance to take over as Managing Director a few years later. This was a challenging role, and it is still challenging me. In the last few years we’ve established DIALux, we’ve introduced LUMsearch, a luminaire search engine, the DIALux mobile app, and many more online services. The building design field was developed as well, and we developed a design theory for intelligent buildings that we now teach.
You’ve been Managing Director of DIAL for almost 20 years now, how has the company, and the lighting industry as a whole, changed in those years?
20 years ago DIAL was already an interesting company. Perhaps 20 employees were sitting in a few rooms in an old factory. We conducted seminars in lighting and KNX and DIALux’s success was just beginning. Today 90 employees are working at DIAL. We are working in our new company building, whose architecture we designed by ourselves, along with the lighting and the intelligence inside. It was an opportunity for us to show to customers that we understand what we are teaching. The lighting industry has sped up a lot. LEDs have become the one and only relevant light source, and the digital transformation of nearly everything is also happening in lighting and building automation. Many manufacturers are questioning themselves about what this means for their products and business models. Everyone is asking how they might earn money in future. In general we observe a huge uncertainty, and there are good reasons for it. Disruption happens.
How has the emergence of ‘Smart Lighting’ impacted DIAL?
Many people are talking about ‘Smart Lighting’. Some think that ‘smart’ means that it can be controlled via smart phone. For me, smart lighting is where the user does not have to worry about it. It switches on when you need it and offers the quantity and quality of light wherever you need it. For this to happen, a good designer is needed, along with a customer who wants to get such a solution. For us it is interesting and melts together our core competencies in lighting and smart buildings.
DIAL has just launched a new book: Smart Building Design - Conception, Planning, Realisation and Operation. What is the background behind this book? How was it conceived?
With this book we want to explain to readers how smart buildings can become reality. In short, by designing them. We believe strongly in the vision that architecture will become dynamic and intelligent. This is technically possible already and has been for quite a long time, but has never happened. Whenever you tell someone something about building automation most people reject it. They fear it might be too expensive, has no sense and does not function. They are right. The reason is: building automation it not part of a holistic design process. The design of the automation, how the building should behave, needs to become part of the general design process of the building. For the stakeholders this has been difficult to understand. From the designers perspective it is clear and easy: There is one product to design and it consists of both a shape and its function or behaviour. The synergy is one single thing, a product you might call a smart building.
Who is the book primarily aimed at? Lighting Designers? Manufacturers? Architects?
All of them. Of course the architect has the strongest position to put things forward into this direction. I know many architects, not all of them are convinced that technology and software will play a key role in the value of the buildings they design. Yet.
The book offers an insight into DIAL’s thoughts on how “Smart Buildings” should be designed. How important is lighting in the Smart Building concept?
Lighting is only one part. Doubtless an important part, because it affects people so much and because it plays a key role in the perception of spaces. But the challenge and the biggest value of intelligent buildings can only be achieved when everything is connected. It is a huge mistake to treat light individually.
Is this the first book that DIAL has produced? Do you have plans to work on any more?
Our first book was about how lighting can improve wellbeing. We wanted to put an emphasis on lighting design for the wellbeing of people instead of focussing on illuminances and power consumption, as it is too often the case. Lighting designers need to know that lighting affects wellbeing, and this needs to be taken into account. We are influencing people’s behaviour and health. We conducted research and published the results with this first publication. The results became a key aspect of the seminars we offer for lighting designers at DIAL today.
What do you think the future holds for the lighting industry?
What a huge question! Many possibilities, less restrictions, huge challenges but also risks. Everything is possible, technology gets cheaper and the margins shrink. IP connectivity of nearly every item allows solutions nobody thought of yesterday.
David Morgan Review: formalighting Motolux Range
Following its appearance at darc room, David Morgan takes a closer look at formalighting’s extensive Motolux range of motorised architectural lighting products.
When a lighting company started by two Italian brothers in London in the 1960s grows into an international business with headquarters in Milan and Hong Kong, sales offices in New York, London and Shanghai, it seems certain that the company will also have a highly adventurous approach to product development.
formalighting was founded in the UK by brothers Guido & Lorenzo Maghnagi as a distributor for a number of Italian lighting brands, including iGuzzini. The Maghnagi brothers chose to open their showroom in the Business Design Centre in Islington.
Working with leading Italian designers, the company then started to develop its own architectural lighting products. Lorenzo moved to Hong Kong and established one of the first European-owned lighting factories in China to manufacture these ranges. The combination of Italian design flair with the lower manufacturing costs available in China has allowed the company to expand steadily over 50 years and it now employs more than 180 staff worldwide.
When I first met Lorenzo in the 1970s, I would not have predicted that formalighting would become the kind of company to create an impressive range of motorised architectural lighting products, but that is precisely what they have achieved.
The benefits of being able to aim and focus projector luminaires without the need for cherry pickers, scaffolds or ladders have become more obvious due to increasing health and safety at work legislation. These requirements have dramatically increased the costs of manual aiming in larger spaces. Conversely, the production costs of remote-controlled luminaires have fallen as the various enabling digital technologies develop, which in turn has widened the market opportunity.
Looking specifically at formalighting’s Motolux range, it initially started as a collaboration with an American engineer who had an existing patent for a fairly simple form of motorised lighting, although the history of motorised and remote-controlled lighting dates back to a much earlier period in the 1920s. Technical pioneers, including Herbert F King from Massachusetts, first filed a patent for a fiendishly complicated mechanism with separate control of pan and tilt, all driven by electric motors, which would allow products on display in shop windows to be individually lit in sequence. A little later in 1929, Charles Andreino from Canada patented a similarly complex remote-controlled, motorised spotlight system that included focus control.
The first, and fairly limited, product introduction of the Motolux range was at Light + Building in 2016, which resulted in a new patent for the motorised multi-axis gimbal rings. The initial range was well received and the formalighting development team spent the next two years leading up to this year’s Light + Building show creating an impressive twelve different product families incorporating the technology. These families include individual recessed downlights, multiple recessed projectors, track mounted projectors, pendants and surface mounted luminaires, as well as some exterior IP-rated versions of these types. In many cases the remote-controlled versions are based on the original, manually aimed, luminaires, which are still available for simpler projects.
The Motolux range is so extensive that there is not enough space in this review to discuss any particular luminaire in detail. If I was to choose one of my favourite products I would opt for the Moto Ola, a minimal pendant gimbal with motor control suspended on two slender power cables. The Moto Ola can be fitted with a Soraa Snap light engine so that all the Soraa snap accessories can be attached magnetically. The head can be rotated in both axes although at this point, as far as I know, the suspension cable length is not remotely controlled. However cable length control is available, if required, with the rather larger Moto Roulette pendant.
The smallest track mounted spotlight in the range is the Moto Zero 40 Compasso, which is only 40mm in diameter. The mechanisms incorporated within the various luminaires are highly miniaturised, and have been cleverly designed so if the luminaire body is rotated manually, no mechanical damage is caused and automatically resets to the start position when powered up.
The Motolux range introduced this year includes a very wide variety of light engine options and complementary technologies which supplement and compliment the motorised control. Mechanical focusing is available as one option but other versions incorporate the LensVector liquid crystal solid state focusing system, which I reviewed in arc 104. One of the advantages of incorporating Lens Vector is that the luminaire size is reduced to that of a non-focusing product. Apparently, formalighting was one of the first companies to develop luminaire designs incorporating the early LensVector technology.
A dedicated Motolux hand transmitter is available that enables all the functions to be individually controlled for each luminaire, but there are also versions incorporating Casambi wireless control. When a luminaire is selected for control either by the hand transmitter or via Casambi, a green indicator LED lights.
The variety of light engines available includes tuneable white, dim to warm and colour changing. The remarkable full spectrum Lumenetix LED module, providing both tuneable white and colour changing, can also be incorporated in the range complete with Casambi control, which is another first for formalighting.
formalighting has created a well-designed and very comprehensive range of remote-controlled luminaires that can be used in a wide variety of architectural and retail lighting applications. Their ambition to push the boundaries of product development has set them on a clear trajectory to increase the overall market size and their share of this market segment.
Intra Acousto
Acousto is a luminaire that features a sound absorber with excellent absorption, making the area not only quieter but also more private. Acousto is suitable for applications when creating large and open spaces with a majority of hard surfaces and an echo or when you’re simply seeking a different and green solution. The addition of the MOSSwall panels not only help absorb the noise but also bring nature indoors with maintenance-free.
LEDiL Daisy
Make your office look good and increase wellbeing in the workplace with DAISY, the LED optic for a modern, glare-free office.The 1.1-metre long black shade eliminates glare and is a perfect fit for today’s office. As well as making the luminaire look elegant, the housing works seamlessly with the lenses to provide uniform lighting with high in-use-efficacy.
Prilux Hexagon
Hexagon is the new modular projector designed by Prilux. Its performance and versatility makes it a great choice for high-altitude enclosures, sports, cultural, industrial buildings and tunnels. Equipped with DALI regulation system as standard, it allows for creative lighting spaces, adapting them to the needs of each application.
Sylvania Pixer
Pixer is an architectural office luminaire range that focuses on aesthetics as well as ambience. The product is based around illuminated ‘Pods’ that can either be recessed (to create a clean/flush ceiling) or dropped (offering flexibility and creating enhanced ambience) a mix of dropped and recessed pods provides a unique solution with enhanced visual interest. Pixer can be manipulated into either a square or rectangular form and meets and exceeds UGR <19 standards with SylSmart technology as standard on certain models.
Unilamp Athlon
The Athlon family is a functional mini spotlight/floodlight. The slim and clean design of Athlon allows a hidden installation. Athlon is designed for a streamlined time effective installation. Tight beam control utilises selected lenses from world-renowned manufacturers. Athlon is available with symmetric, asymmetric and bisymmetric light distributions and the broad range of accessories such as a ground spike, tree strap, colour filters, honey comb louver and glare shield hood makes it a dynamic floodlight choice.
Khatod Nactus 6X2 SIL
These optical modules are made of ultra-clear silicone, consisting of twelve optics with 25.40mm lens pitch. Engineered for 3.5x3.5mm Power LEDs, they also fit 5x5mm package LEDs. Three beams: IESNA Type II/ III /V medium cutoff. IESNA Type III optics also meet ME3A requirements. Designed to comply with IP65 rating and IK10 rating (20 Joules). No glass cover is required. They system boasts high optical efficiency, great temperature resistance, non-yellowing effect and also available with holder in PC, on request.
Smart Lighting increases workplace satisfaction, research shows
(Netherlands) - Research from Signify indicates that investing in smart lighting could lead to increased workplace satisfaction among employees.
Over half of small and medium-sized enterprises struggle to recruit talent and two in five have issues retaining employees, according to new research from Signify, formerly Philips Lighting.
The findings show that over half of the employees surveyed said they’d be in favor of their company investing in connected tech, specifically smart lighting, ahead of other improvements.
“High workplace satisfaction influences engagement and the reputation of a business as a great place to work. So it’s no surprise that SMEs are looking into connected tech options to enhance engagement,” said Bianca van der Zande, research scientist at Signify.
“Nowadays with new technologies including LED and IoT, lighting can be a powerful influencer in the workplace. It has a big impact on how people can control lighting.
“With about half of the surveyed employees being in favour of having smart lighting installed, this could be an excellent way for SMEs to make the workplace more appealing to current and potential employees. We want to see this reflected in our working environments where connected tech is an important way to appeal to the best and brightest.”
When it comes to connected technology usage among SMEs, nearly one in five (17%) already use it in some form in their business, and just under a third (29%) are interested in doing so in the future.
Dr. Craig Knight, Chartered Psychologist, Honorary Research Fellow (Exon), Director of Identity Realization Ltd, agreed on the importance of lighting at work, saying: “Light can have astonishing effects within the workplace. It has been shown to be at once invigorating, calming and sculptural. Yet too many businesses pay scant attention to light, offering cheap rather than effective solutions. Science suggests that poor lighting strategies put wellbeing, happiness and productivity in jeopardy.”
The benefits of smart lighting could go beyond improved employee wellbeing and engagement. Of the SMEs that have areas that customers or clients visit, over a third thought that smart lighting would improve the customer or client experience. Employees are even more positive about the effects though, with 61% believing that smart lighting would give customers and clients a more favourable opinion of a business.
Future Designs unveil ‘anti-showroom’
(UK) - Future Designs’ new ‘anti-showroom’ harnesses virtual reality to create immersive lighting environments for visitors.
Future Designs has launched the first ‘anti-showroom’ in Clerkenwell. Clerkenwell Lighthouse on Dallington Street will champion light and showcase the latest innovations in commercial lighting, while through the use of Virtual Reality (VR) visitors can experience an immersive lighting environment without there being one single light fitting on display, as well as exposure to the latest technology in tunable white light technology.
It is intended that this new space will bring together the very latest thinking and technology from the lighting world and beyond, becoming a hub for forums, events and demonstrations.
The technology hub comprises two floors: a ground floor, which can be viewed from Dallington Street and Pardon Street, and the larger below-ground working area. The floors represent contrast with a bright and open ground floor and a darker more hidden basement, as there is no light without dark. They explore a public area and a more private area, a space to educate and a space to work, a place of experience and a place of discovery.
The VR experience will allow visitors to experience first hand the different options for lighting space. Once in the VR zone viewers will be able to step into another dimension and experience many lighting scenarios at their fingertips, seamlessly switching from one to the other, experiencing the effect of the colour temperatures possible through FUTURE’s product offering. The goal is not just to give the user a more realistic visual representation of the lighting applications, but also the feeling and perception of space, delivered through FUTURE Designs luminaires and design principles.
David Clements, Managing Director of Future Designs said: “Being able to see our light fittings is still hugely important to our customers, however only through VR can you truly experience the lighting concepts put forward prior to their physical installation. Clerkenwell Lighthouse is the opportunity to provide a truly unique experience that will assist in the decision-making process.”
Clerkenwell Lighthouse was designed by BDG architecture + design, an international architecture and design consultancy, who created a unique digital and immersive environment to best showcase Future Designs as a brand and display its products and capabilities.
Freemark Abbey, USA
With the help of Studio Three Twenty One, the Freemark Abbey winery has a new lighting scheme that tastefully pays tribute to the site's rich history.
The Freemark Abbey winery in Napa Valley, California, has undergone a large-scale renovation, with a new lighting scheme, courtesy of San Francisco-based lighting designers Studio Three Twenty One.
The winery was first opened in 1886, commissioned by the first female vintner in California, Josephine Tychson, and in the 130 years since its inception has grown in both size and reputation. The site features a beautiful stone building, constructed with stone from the nearby Glass Mountain by the same labourers that worked the field and produced the wine.
The building was designed to provide stable year-round temperatures to support wine making in the heat of the wine country, while the thick and heavy stone structure was intended to be dark and uninviting to keep out light and heat. The beautiful and organic variations in the stone coursework and mortar highlight the handmade quality of this structure, and its evolution over time. Purchased by Jackson Family Wines in August of 2006, the new owners wanted to pay tribute to the site's rich history while looking to the future, and planned a renovation to the landmark stone structure, which began in 2015.
There were a number of challenges facing the adaptive reuse of this structure; first and foremost was the goal to use light to celebrate and observe the original stone façades while creating warm and inviting light-filled spaces with very flexible and adaptive uses.
The client requested an entirely LED lighting system to reduce maintenance and operating expenses while meeting California Title 24 - an energy efficiency standard to preserve outdoor and indoor environmental quality throughout the state.
Another challenge came in planning for multiple uses within the building, each requiring separate electrical services and meters. The dimming control system design required linking five independent dimming systems for the five different building uses: winery, restaurant, retail, ballroom and cafe.
Lighting Designers at Studio Three Twenty One worked closely with project architect SB Architects and interior designer Brayton Hughes Design Studio on the project, developing AutoDesk Revit and 3D Studio Max lighting models, calculations and renderings to simulate and study the interaction of natural day lighting and artificial electric lighting. These studies informed the team to optimise the location, shape, and size of glazing types and shading for the new feature skylights. Designers studied the interaction of sidelight and skylight within the spaces as well as the integration of daylight and electric light throughout the year to optimise each system.
Studio Three Twenty One worked with Aion LED to integrate its direct and indirect linear LED lighting into the building structure to highlight and celebrate the beautiful stone walls, as well as the upper level vaulted ceilings. Aion LED was both a strategic partner and vendor for the project by working with the lighting designers closely to create the dramatic vision of lighting that they were looking for while developing smaller, tighter profiles, and modified mounting assemblies to make it possible to always conceal the source of the lighting, while meeting the client’s budget.
The front of the building along Highway 29 was tailored to meet the needs of the new indoor/outdoor restaurant, while the upper level also includes a retail hall, wine tasting and VIP tasting venues. The lower level includes a pre-function space, barrel room, event space, wine library and café that spills out into the courtyard beyond the east façade of the building.
The indirect landscape lighting and façade uplighting creates a warm and inviting connection between the interior and exterior spaces, and supports the outdoor patio café and restaurant functions, including a lounge, bar, dining space and Yakitori grill.
www.studio-321.com
www.sb-architects.com
www.bhdstudios.com
www.aionled.com
Zumtobel launch 2018 Photographic Competition
(Austria) - The Zumtobel Photographic Competition has opened for entries, based on the theme “Photos You Can Feel”.
Now in its 22nd year, the unique Zumtobel Photographic Competition, in which entrants are invited to show off their photographic talent using a dedicated app, has opened for entries.
Since its inception, more than ten thousand architects have entered the Zumtobel Photographic Competition, providing great images that helped to make it a ‘must do’ in the architectural calendar. Partnering with photographer Emmanuel Cole, the 2018 competition has the theme “Photos You Can Feel” and this year Zumtobel has the feeling that there will be even more imaginative entries than in past years as it grows in popularity.
Participants can enter by registering using the website www.zumtobelphoto.com, after which an email will then be sent with a link to download the app. They are then invited to take pictures that utilise light using the app, with a limit of 24 exposures. Previous winners can be found on the dedicated Instagram and Twitter accounts.
Images will upload automatically to the website where visitors can view both their own pictures and those of others. The competition closes on 21st December, after which entries will be judged by a 7-person panel made up of journalists, architects and Emmanuel Cole.
The top 20 finalists will be invited to a presentation event where they will be presented with their picture framed. There will also be prizes for the top three entries.
