Lighting
Why lighting is a designer choice
but also about design. No wonder many buyers find the issue of lighting design to be so opaque. Faced with choosing between halogen, tungsten, metal halide, LED, crown reflectors, uplighters, downlighters, gullwings, flurorescents, sensor controls, daylight controls and the rest (including the Sun) it’s little wonder that many buyers fall back on meeting a standard requirement when it comes to specifying lighting.
Yet, while providing 500 lux levels throughout a space with compact fluorescent tubes as the main artificial light source might provide a decent level of light, taking this approach may be counter-productive. Bad lighting schemes can be an invisible source of problems. People can feel unwell without knowing why. So the issue of lighting design should be raised during the brief as a key issue.
Lighting can often be left too late in the design process. So when and
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if budget becomes increasingly tight, this can lead you to focus on accepting the norm. But people are increasingly prepared to understand the business case and see the benefits.
Often however, cost seems to be the most significant factor in developing a lighting design. This is what lies behind the enduring popularity of the compact fluorescent tube which is nothing if not a cheap and reasonably effective solution. But the fact remains that you should use different types of light and different light levels to create a feeling of well being and as a way of structuring interior space.
Facilities managers are ideally suited to take into account whole life costs and product life
Ann Clarke, Group Design Director of Claremont Group Interiors, explains why lighting isn’t always about energy,
cycles of a lighting scheme. Cost and maintenance are big factors, but organisations should also look at issues such as whole life costing and performance. For example, you can specify to a certain lux level but - through usage - lamps can reduce in their performance, especially if they are of an inferior quality. You must also take care that specifications are not so complex that you need to stock 35 types of lamp if possible.
Weighed up against cost and whole life issues there is also the underlying one of how well lighting
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