It is always really exciting to get new photos of our work.

Our involvement in projects often spans several years – a case in point is the West Gate Freeway which we started working on back in May 2007, 3 years ago now.  Our involvement was to design the lighting from the mouth of the Burnley Tunnel through to the start of the West Gate Bridge (about 8km in total).  Aside from the road lighting itself, we designed the lighting to the urban design features by Denton Corker Marshall; namely the portals and wedges that you may have seen or even driven through.

Last week we sent Peter Bennetts to site with his camera and, as usual, he has created some magical images.  I must admit I was a little concerned when he told me he was balanced on top of a step ladder on the corner of the Montague Street intersection to get one of the shots.  That’s commitment for you.

West Gate Freeway Portal

It is with great pride that I announce that the MTC Theatre and Robina Shopping Centre light sculpture have been awarded the IES International Lighting Design Award.

While I get to collect the awards, the awards really go to the whole Electrolight team.  We are all about collaboration here and I believe that our work is strong because we have such a diverse range of talented people feeding into the design process.

And you know what, while it’s always a surprise and privilege to receive these awards, this is for work that we  conceived several years ago now.  Wait till you see the new stuff we have that hasn’t been installed yet.  I’m talking the new Melbourne Rectangular Stadium, Lonsdale Street Dandenong, Westfield Sydney City, Perth Theatre etc. etc.

MTC Theatre

Robina Shopping Centre Light Sculpture

Every once in a while you get a project that you just love, and its not always the ones you’d expect.

It has been a couple of years at least since we were invited to put in a proposal for the refurbishment of Lonsdale Street, the main street in Dandenong.

Dandenong is best part of an hour from central Melbourne and has a rich social and cultural history; it was once a major centre for heavy industry in Australia and attracted migrants from all around the world to make Dandenong home.  But like many such places that type of work has vanished, leaving in its place some social problems.  Things are changing now; the heavy industry is being replaced by more technological work and the place is very much on the up again. And you can say what you like about Dandenong; there is no denying its character and soul.

Anyway, we were fortunate enough to get the gig and to work alongside some of our favourite collaborators in the industry.  The client is VicUrban who are pumping an astonishing $200m ++ into the project, making this the most significant urban renewal project in Victoria outside of Docklands.  The lead designer is a partnership between TCL and BKK; practices who both truly believe in collaboration and are genuinely interested in contributions to the design process from outside .  Then we had our artist introduced to the project, the wonderful David Sequeira who seemed to understand in an instant what this project was about and was driven not to create a monument to himself but to have his creativity feed into the design of the less glamourous things such as tree selections, paver types and, thankfully, the lighting scheme.

One afternoon at TCL’s offices there was a workshop between TCL, BKK, David Sequiera, Rachel Burke and me.  Over the course of that session we collectively dreamt up the feature lighting scheme which consist of over 100 LED light sticks which will be installed at 6m intervals along the central median of the road.  Each of the sticks will be programmed to be set at a unique colour – representing the cultural diversity of Dandenong itself.

And the really exciting this is that when Rachel went to site last week the first dozen or so were installed – see below.

It’s not all glamour being a lighting designer you know.

Last week, Jess and I left Melbourne and took the early flight to Perth to visit the site of the New Performing Arts Centre.  With the time difference we arrived at lunchtime Melbourne time which was of course the start of the day in Perth.  Our hosts (the wonderful Kerry Hill Architects) had put together a schedule of meetings, inspections and visits to keep us busy.  After the first 2 or 3 meetings out stomachs were rumbling.  There was talk of a visit to the Shangai restaurant.  Our mouths were watering but instead we were off to an aluminium pipe factory on the outskirts of Perth to look at a prototype of the ‘bronze box’ chandelier for the main entrance (see below).

By now we were weak with hunger.  It was by now almost 6pm Melbourne time, we’d been on the go all day and all we’d eaten was an Uncle Toby muesli bar.  At one stage Jess thought he was on a set from Survivor.  We think the chandelier was OK, hard to tell, eye watering by now.  Eventually we made it to the Shanghai and was restored sufficiently to tackle the afternoon’s schedule.

The timing of our trip was opportune.  There was quite some excitement amongst the sparkies – the first lights had been wired and were awaiting switch-on.  We were honoured to witness the event – some humble fluoro downlights illuminating the studio theatre rehearsal space but nonetheless an important milestone.  And did they look OK?  We think so; see below.  Plenty of light, nice and even, no unsightly scallops – we’ll settle for that.

More inspections, another meeting and then we’re done, just in time to check out the eateries of Northbridge.  By now it’s past midnight Melbourne time.  Its late when we get back to the hotel and then we’re up again at 4.30 to catch the red-eye back to Melbourne with mission accomplished.

Don’t get me wrong, we love it really!

Electrolight are contributing to the 2010 MIDSUMMA Festival by creating an exciting light sculpture to be installed on the fence of the T-Dance Party on January 17th.  The sculpture will comprise some 100 coloured fluoros kindly donated by our friends at Concord Sylvania.

We would like your input by voting on 1 of the 3 design options shown in videos below.  Leave a comment in the space provided at the end of this blog with 01, 02 or 03 as your chosen design. And just because we can, we are giving away a pair of tickets to the author of the comment we like the best and will install the design which gets the most votes.  How good is that?