The New York City Section of the Illuminating Engineering Society (IESNYC) recently announced the winners of the 2011 Lumen Awards, which recognizes the industry’s most innovative lighting projects.

Eleven awards in three categories were bestowed, including the Lumen Award of Excellence, the highest level of recognition for permanent architectural application, the Lumen Award of Merit, meritorious recognition in permanent architectural application, and the Lumen Citation, special recognition awards for an art installation, technical detail, portion of a single project, temporary installation or other work.

AWARD OF EXCELLENCE
Science Storms at the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, IL
Lighting Design Firm: Focus Lighting, Inc. – Paul Gregory, JR Krauza, Joshua Spitzig, Dan Henry, and Kenneth Schutz
Architect: Evidence Design – Jack Pascarosa and Shari Berman
Photography: Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago – J.B Spector

How can light inspire young minds? That was one of the driving questions behind Science Storms at the Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago. It is a dramatic and interactive environment where guests of all ages can explore the physics of light and the science behind powerful natural phenomena. It is a 26,000-square-foot permanent exhibition showcasing 50 large-scale exhibits and experiments. These interactive experiments include a 40-foot tall tornado of swirling vapor and light, a 20ft diameter spinning avalanche disk, an automated heliostat, and suspended ripple tanks that are illuminated from the ceiling to project wave patterns onto guests below.

“Lighting plays a tremendous part in creating the museum’s dramatic interactive environment,” says Paul Gregory, principal of Focus Lighting, Inc. “The positive outcome of joining the creative team early on in the process is irreplaceable. Unifying the team in the beginning stages ensures the best possible design. Without an initial understanding, it is impossible to integrate ideas for the lighting design into the structure.”

AWARD OF EXCELLENCE
Arthouse, Austin, TX
Lighting Design Firm: Lumen Architecture, PLLC – Nelson Jenkins, AIA, LC, IES, LEED
and Alejandro Bulaevsky
Photography: Lumen Architecture – Nelson Jenkins and Michael Moran Studio, Michael Moran

Both a theater and department store in previous incarnations, Arthouse blurs any distinction between art and architecture. Its lighting both dazzles and embraces modernity through light and form. Despite a tight budget and strict energy allowances, the team focused on creating functionality and strong visual elements. The walls of the building ‘speak’, as palimpsest retains the building’s history and is now artistically punctured by LED illuminated green glass blocks that have become a signature of the building both during the day and at night. Every detail of the building has been carefully designed and often hand-crafted to support the creative community it represents and serves.

“I never thought a project could require so many puzzle pieces,” says Nelson Jenkins, principal, Lumen Architecture, PLLC. “The hard work, dedication and both ‘good and bad luck’ played heavily in the ultimate success of this project.”

AWARD OF EXCELLENCE
Art Collector’s Loft, New York, NY
Lighting Design Firm: Renfro Design Group, Inc. – Richard Renfro, Sarah Randall, Fabio Tuchiya, and Andrew Thompson
Photography: Iwan Baan Photography ¬– Iwan Baan

Designing the lighting for the loft of an avid art collector necessitated a lighting strategy that was both comfortable for a permanent residence and responsive to the presentation of art. The sweeping curvilinear aspect of the architecture combined with the owner’s request to never see a light fixture provided a challenging task for discretely embedding the lighting into the architecture. Working within the shell of a formerly industrial space, we were given the added challenge of making the large central gallery appear to float under a soaring ceiling that was actually just under 9’ tall.

“Our goal was to conceal the lighting systems in order to reveal the exceptional architecture and provide a luminous environment for the art,” says Richard Renfro, principal, Renfro Design Group, Inc.

AWARD OF MERIT
Lincoln Center, New York, NY
Lighting Design Firm: Tillotson Design Associates – Suzan Tillotson and David Burya
Photography: Iwan Baan Photography – Iwan Baan

The lighting of the exterior plazas at Lincoln Center brings about a glamorous evening experience sympathetic to the surrounding iconic buildings. The lighting intensifies the patrons’ anticipation of the dramatic arts they have come to celebrate. Drama is fashioned through the careful and precise illumination of new architectural elements. Translucent glass canopies appear to glow from within, dramatic fountain and under-bench lighting entices, subtle tree Bosque uplighting creates alluring intimate settings and the simulation of peaceful moonlighting at the roof lawn adds to the inviting nature of the urban site as a place for public gathering.

AWARD OF MERIT
Bank of America Tower at One Bryant Park, New York, NY
Lighting Design Firm: Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design, Inc.– Francesca Bettridge, Michael Hennes, and Mitul Parekh
Project Owner: The Durst Organization, Inc. – Louis Esposito
Photography: Esto Photographics, Inc. – David Sundberg and Cook + Fox Architects – Ryan Browne

Cline Bettridge Bernstein’s innovative lighting design solution for this first-ever LEED Platinum skyscraper creates a dramatic nighttime presence for its crystalline structure. Horizontal bands of white LEDs illuminate a clear glass façade facet that extends from the 21st floor up to the crown. Rising above the crown, a 300-ft. tall spire incorporates RGB LED floodlights with DMX controls, producing an array of color-changing and dynamic effects. After dark, the tower’s lighting transforms it into a feature on the City skyline, demonstrating that iconic lighting is achievable within the framework of sustainable design.

AWARD OF MERIT
155 North Wacker, Chicago, IL
Lighting Design Firm: One Lux Studio, LLC – Stephen Margulies
Photgraphy: Tom Rossiter Photography

The new 1.4 million square foot office tower at 155 N. Wacker in Chicago boasts a brand new lobby and arcade that activates the streetscape and creates a dynamic public space entry into this innovative corporate center. The lobby and arcade are contiguous to each other and a powerful diagonal grid is overlayed to both spaces. The ceiling lighting was designed to seamlessly connect the interior lobby and exterior arcade. Concealed LED strip lights mounted within an architecturally constructed cove create the strong diagonal lines and perform unaffected by changes in ambient temperature in interior as well as exterior environments.

LUMEN CITATION FOR LIBRARY RESTORATION
The Morgan Library & Museum – McKim Library Restoration, New York, NY
Lighting Design Firm: Renfro Design Group, Inc. – Richard Renfro, Eileen M.E. Pierce, and Azusa Yabe
Project Owner: The Morgan Library & Museum
Phototgraphy: The Morgan Library & Museum – Graham Haber and Renfro Design Group, Inc.

This interior landmarked space employed technological lighting upgrades to discretely reinforce the architecture with concealed fixtures, refurbished historical fittings, and newly incorporated exhibits and cases. In the library, mock-ups juxtaposed with the existing conditions affirmed the design solutions. Visible track fixtures and poor-color rendering fluorescents were replaced with LED strips. Additionally, the 2nd and 3rd tiers were lit from the glass floor to shield the upward gaze. Finally, the original pendant was reinstalled and high-color rendering lamps revitalized the priceless tapestry and art objects. With the restoration and preservation complete, this space has been renewed to the grandeur of decades past.

LUMEN CITATION FOR LIGHTING TRANSFORMATION
Mall of America, South Avenue Renovation, Bloomington, MN
Lighting Designer: Cooley Monato Studio – Renée Cooley and Jenny Ivansson
Architects: DLR|KKE – Natina James and Gabellini Sheppard Associates, LLP – Michael Gabellini, FAIA, Kimberly Sheppard, AIA, and Dan Garbowit, AIA
Project Owner: Mall of America
Photography: Paul Warchol Photography – Paul Warchol

The renovation of “South Avenue” sought to unify the space by resolving the existing installation’s lack of cohesion and strove to give the space a strong sense of place. Lighting was integrated within the architecture to achieve spatial clarity and to create a comfortably luminous surround with intermittent sparkle. Ambient light emanates from fluorescent coves and from the ceiling and pedestrian bridges which incorporate backlit translucent fabric panels. Architect-designed crystal sculptures glisten from fiber optic points above. The juxtaposition of polished and matte finishes is enhanced by direct lighting. In combination, a more relaxed and defined space was created.

LUMEN CITATION FOR RESIDENTIAL LIGHTING
Flavor Paper, Brooklyn, NY
Lighting Design Firm: Lighting Workshop – Doug Russell and Steven Espinoza
Project Owner: Flavor Paper
Photography: Boone Speed

Flavor Paper’s repurposing of a former beer warehouse in Cobble Hill Brooklyn into a design studio, apartments, and owner’s penthouse, was imagined as an architectural statement as bold as their eccentric designs. A neon installation reveals itself in a vault beneath the sidewalk and climbs through the glass-front stair tower. Inside the penthouse, wall and ceiling planes clad in crocodile skin float below a layer of honey-colored indirect illumination, while custom chandeliers and illuminated tables conjure the owner’s fascination with reflective pattern. On the owner’s rooftop oasis, illuminated skylights give a nod to the neighboring church steeples.

LUMEN CITATION FOR FAÇADE LIGHTING
Burj Khalifa, Dubai
Lighting Design Firm: Fisher Marantz Stone, Inc.
Paul Marantz and Hank Forrest
Architect: Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Adrian Smith
Owner: EMAAR Properties
Photography: Photo © Tim Griffith and Fisher Marantz Stone, Inc.

A tower, so tall and slender that it dwarfs everything around it, does not need a spectacle of light to ensure its visibility. Floodlighting this tower, the world’s tallest, from site perimeter was not an option, as the sweeping desert sands and high humidity from the Arabian Gulf would tent the structure in a perennial cloud. The narrow, almost vertical solution is an exposition of restrained and minimalist design. Raking uplight from atop the terraced prows of the building’s three legs saves energy and ensures minimal light trespass for the residential tenants and little skylight pollution.

LUMEN CITATION FOR SIMPLE AND PLAYFUL USE OF LIGHT
ABKCO Music and Records, New York, NY
Lighting Design Firm: RS Lighting Design – Randy Sabedra
Architect: Highland Associates – Glenn Leitch, Elizabeth Demello, Eric Scott, and Deborah Lorenzo
Photography: Highland Associates – Beata Kowalczyk-Wolosz and Mick Rock

Maximizing daylight, expanding spatial boundaries, and a unique illumination scheme were the lighting goals for this music company’s work place; filled with iconic rock and roll history and celebrated achievements. “Art as light and light as music” was the lighting inspiration – playful, fluid and gradient, contrasted with crisp luminous shapes: a microphone chandelier adds sparkle, ceiling domes are laid out to resemble a “drum kit,” a curved cove mimics layered sheet music, a continuous cove illuminates the space, and hovering above a back lit ceiling spills light into the offices as an architectural cloud. The project meets ASHRAE 90.1-2007.