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WINDS OF CHANGE
Dubbed Tornando Tower by locals, the Qipco Office Tower uses custom created nodes with an ‘extreme heavy duty’ design to realise a dynamic façade scheme by Emdelight.
On its completion in 2009, the Qipco Office Tower, known locally as the Tornado Tower made an instant impact on the Doha hori- zon. Built as the new headquarters for the Qatar Investment & Project Development Holding Company, the tower’s distinctive shape - a cylindrical form, narrowing at its midpoint - seemed to symbolise dramatic changes that were sweeping across the city. Its success was due in no small part to the exterior lighting scheme created by Thomas Emde and his team at Emdelight. At night the diagonal grid façade comes to life thanks to custom-made LED fixtures placed at the intersection of the structural girders. Each fixture comprises five RGB LED light sources. Four of these throw narrow beams of light along the length of the connecting girders while the fifth provides an omni-di- rectional glowing light point in its centre. In total, 540 luminaires were installed on the façade. Manufactured by Lehner Werk Metall, each one uses LED modules built by feno. A centre board holds three LEDs (red, green, blue), emitting light towards the front. This board also supplies the four side sources, which also comprise an RGB trio of LEDs. Each set is covered by a colour-mix-
ing lens from Polymer-Optics in the UK. For the whole façade, a total of 27,540 Luxeon Rebel LEDs were used.
The lighting concept was tested in a series of mock ups, facilitated by the construction of an actual-size, four-floor section of the façade in both Frankfurt and Doha. As well as the function of the fixture, an appropri- ate housing had to be found to satisfy the archtiect’s colour concept and the durabili- ty requirements caused by the Middle East’s extreme climatic conditions.
The lamp itself, along with the entire con- trol system, was designed to an ‘extreme heavy-duty’ standard, ensuring its ability to withstand the extreme temperatures and climatic conditions of the Gulf region. Each LED is individually addressable and controlled with software provided by Feiner Lichttechnik. 8,100 channels, organised in 18 universes allow an almost limitless range of illumination options.
In the finished scheme, pulsating and oscillating coloured lights create a myriad of effects that ultimately cover the entire surface of the tower and wrap it in brilliant hues.
www.emdelight.com
PROJECT DETAILS
Tornado Tower, Doha, Qatar Client: Tornado Tower Company
Architect: CICO Consulting Architects & Engineers / SIAT Architekten + Ingenieure München GmbH Lighting Design: Emdelight
LIGHTING SPECIFIED
540 x Lehner WerkMetall custom luminaires comprising: - feno LED modules - Philips Luxeon Rebel LEDs
Below A full-scale, four-floor mock up of the façade was created to help test not only the luminaires, but also their integration into the structure. All pics: Ralph Larmann.
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