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The Gallery of Honour. Here the museum displays its most valuable pieces. The lighting is a blend of diffuse daylight and soft accents with LED. Photo: Roos Aldershoff
of LED and a re-worked gallery layout by Wilmotte and the museum required a different approach.
Then you left Arup...
Indeed, in 2010. Many in the industry were surprised. I received some remarkable letters from my peers; I never realised it would cause such a stir! I loved the work at Arup, and I felt it was a very special mission to be the firm’s head of lighting design. I think I contributed a lot to the success in the years before I left, the prizes and the recognition as an artistic team. But joining a lighting company with very strong competencies in research and development, meant that I could have influence again. Influence, that - as I see it - has shifted from the lighting designers in the analogue era to manufacturers in today’s digital times. The Rijksmuseum is perhaps an outstanding example of that: I can not imagine that a manufacturer would take the lead in such a project, even five years ago
It was certainly not a given that Philips would get the assignment, even though the company is the museum’s Founder (largest sponsor). The museum kept this rightfully separated and actually considered many alternatives. But the combination of research, the latest LED developments at Philips Lumileds, and the desire of
the Philips team to collaborate with all designers and museum staff made it a winning proposal I think. With Philips, we first collaborated with Wilmotte and with the engineers of Bronnenberg, to finalise the design of the ‘light racks’. A track-based system was no longer desirable. Wilmotte & Associés had a much more sizable profile in mind that would repeat across the entire museum. I remember long discussions about whether these ‘light racks’ should be shaped as squares or circles. We ended up using both: the circles in the lower level galleries, and the squares (and in very few places linear versions) on the other floors. Mockups greatly helped the team to make the decision, and we spend considerable time in the basement of the museum building where we had - in all confidentiality - a full scale mockup of a gallery at our disposition.
What made you a winning team? First of all, in an unconditional way I made all resources that Philips could offer available to the museum. Our Dutch organisation provided project management and our product designers got involved to collaborate with Wilmotte. Our team, ‘Iconic Projects’, became responsible for the creation process, and I engaged Beersnielsen to make the new lighting plans and to focus everything. They also focused
everything on site. It’s great to see how they have built their own relationship with the museum and began to work much more in the project. That’s a brilliant spin-off one can only dream of.
Another important factor was that we all had the same objective. Although the installation had to be very competitive on cost, the museum’s Head of Presentations Mr. Tim Zeedijk told us: “I just want the best light”. In other words, Tim wanted my entire team to focus entirely on just that, and he really stimulated all of us to think like that. And I think that’s what he got: the best light.
The best light, what does that mean for you?
For myself it means that we provide comfort. Not the comfort of a big meal, but the comfort of feeling you get to see everything, that you don’t miss anything because the light is not good. The comfort, and the stimulation that comes from understanding that we present the artifact in the best possible way, and that we connect the architecture, the artifacts, their stories and the mind and memory of the visitor. At the same time, ‘the best light’ means that it is as safe as possible for the artifacts, and that we do our best, constantly, to further improve that aspect. But I realised something else, thanks to the
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