'LIGHT BOOSTER' - I AWARD
RHYTHM OF LIGHT COMPETITION
ORGANISER: POLISH LIGHTING INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION
WARSZAWA 2014
 
It would seem obvious that we all appreciate the role of sunlight, accompanying our work and rest, and that we benefit from its beneficial effects throughout the day. And yet, a lighting analysis of a model room showed how little natural light we actually use in the interiors where we spend most of our lives.

The main objective of an open-plan office space is to make the most effective use of the room, i.e. to fill it with a maximum number of optimally designed - and therefore also well-lit - workspaces. Unfortunately, as the analysis confirms, one of the main drawbacks of large open-plan office spaces is the lack of light in the deep tract of these rooms.

The competition entry presents a way of uniformly illuminating large office spaces with natural light. The concept is based on the alternative use of the suspended ceiling and the space above it. The effect of homogeneous yet soft interior lighting is achieved by using the principles of optics to enhance and transmit sunlight into the room.

The idea is to direct the sun's rays coming through the façade of the building into the space above the suspended ceiling as a beam of parallel horizontal rays. This beam, after passing through a Fresnel lens, is concentrated and then dispersed, forming a bundle of rays that spreads out in a so-called light tunnel at the desired angles. The light filling the light tunnel is transmitted into the room through a diffusing suspended ceiling structure made up of reflective surfaces forming a honeycomb pattern. The proposed solution could significantly change the atmosphere of large office interiors in the future and return people to the natural light from which they are today screened off by blinds.