This is the first, and potentially the most important historical fashion exhibition of the decade; graciously hosted by the V&A Museum in South Kensington, London in partnership with the Palais Galliera and The Fashion Museum of the City of Paris, “Gabrielle Chanel- Fashion Manifesto” is the first UK Exhibition dedicated to the work of the eponymous French couturière Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel.
This is the first, and potentially the most important historical fashion exhibition of the decade; graciously hosted by the V&A Museum in South Kensington, London in partnership with the Palais Galliera and The Fashion Museum of the City of Paris, “Gabrielle Chanel- Fashion Manifesto” is the first UK Exhibition dedicated to the work of the eponymous French couturière Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel.
Lighting Design Practice, Studio ZNA chose to work with Precision by Luminii- always confident that the design team at Precision will deliver excellent performing products, with great Color quality, sympathetic light output, and finish. Particularly important when you are lighting a vast arrangement of varying objects, materials, and textures, most of which are over 100 years old.
The durable Pico Display Spotlight with its clean silhouette, makes them a great, sustainable choice for the Kensington based museum. Equally as important for the exhibition itself is that the Pico is lockable; ensuring that the design intention, which is carefully coordinated and aimed by Studio ZNA, will remain, and cannot be accidentally affected.
This isn’t the first time, the Pico has been used in the V&A, since its release, projects have included temporary and permanent exhibitions, with the original lights still in service.
“It’s great to see the Pico still being specified in leading museum projects, over a decade after its original release. It’s a privilege to be lighting such gorgeous pieces of fashion history. The continuous engineering and design improvements we’ve made to the Pico product range remain at the cutting edge of LED technology.” Peter McClelland, Designer of the Pico, Design Director of Precision by Luminii.
If you’re in London and you happen to see this amazing exhibition in person, we’d love to hear your thoughts on your experience. Meanwhile, explore all of our Pico Display Spotlights and discover what makes this mini product range and ideal solution for museums around the world.
The Pico range has three site changeable optics for flexible distribution
A customised Basis Track version of Precision Lighting’s Pico range was specified to illuminate the literary treasures found within Oxford University’s historic Bodleian Libraries.
130 specially adapted variants of the discreet LED spotlights were incorporated into this sublime refurbishment of the Weston Library that serves as the new home for the Bodleian’s special collections, including the Gutenberg Bible and Shakespeare’s First Folio. The Pico spotlights were finished in a superior rubbed bronze; ensuring perfect architectural integration into the wider environment of the Library.
To ensure harmonisation, the Pico spotlights were mounted on the Basis track system from Precision, similarly styled in a complementary rubbed bronze finish.
Precision worked closely with renowned Italian case suppliers, Goppion, to deliver vertical mounting of the lighting track system in prestige display cabinets to best illuminate the works in the Bodleian Library’s collection.
Precision’s Project Manager, Jack Mcleod, explains the co-operation:
“Architectural integration was key to the design scheme, and these bespoke variants of Pico were a perfect answer.
“The delicate finishing was essential and the subtle form-factor of Pico delivered the flexibility required for the vertical mounting in the Goppion cabinets”.
The renovation of the Weston Library was undertaken by award-winning architectural practice Wilkinson Eyre, who were tasked with opening up the building to better improve public access to this important site for academic research; including provisions for exhibition space.
The refurbishment has won praise from the Library’s staff, with Madeline Slaven, Head of Exhibitions at the Bodleian Libraries explaining: “The Pico light fitting gives us the flexibility to add, or take away lights to suit the display, and to position the fitting exactly where we need it. They work extremely well whether we are lighting a caption to be easily read or providing quite low-level illumination on an exhibit such as Magna Carta.“
Wilkson Eyre were tasked with refurbishing the Weston Library as a cultural landmark; and with this successful scheme, the Library joins a pedigree of institutions, including Hampton Court Palace, and London’s Imperial War Museum, that have benefited from the superior benefits that Pico brings to museums and galleries.
Spotlights from across the Pico family have won acclaim from architects and lighting consultants alike thanks to the lockable low friction bearing 360-degree pan mechanism that ensures flexibility for changing exhibition spaces.
The lockable tilt option found in Pico has also won plaudits; with a constant torque tilt mechanism ensuring perfect beam positioning, Pico has become a fond favourite in lighting museums and exhibitions across the globe.
The Watts Gallery, built in 1904, is the largest in Britain to feature the work of a single artist and was recently restored by the architectural practice ZMMA. The aim of Charles Marsden-Smedley’s lighting scheme was to make the lighting as discreet as possible, ‘to illuminate Watts’s works of art – painting and sculpture – to their best advantage, focusing light on the works of art and allowing the walls to remain relatively dark.’ It includes 104 Evo 16 lockable spotlights with 6mm honeycomb louvres, plus another 54 Evo 16s with snoots designed to eliminate glare. They are mounted on 130 metres of three-circuit Eutrac housed in specially designed troughs, and custom finished to match the newly painted ceilings.
An Evo 16 with a Framing Projector attachment was also used for the Sower of the Systems, a remarkable symbolist painting regarded as having changed the course of modern art in Britain. The Framing Projector focuses and lifts the light level on the canvas, without over-illuminating the painting’s gilt frame.
A combination of Precision Lighting’s Pico Zoom and Evo X11 LED fixtures have been selected to illuminate the glamorous new Wedding Dresses exhibition at the V&A Museum. Wedding Dresses 1775-2014 offers an insight into the history of dresses and the lives of the wearers. The exhibition is on display at the museum for 10 months and contains the work of key fashion designers such as Vivienne Westwood, Vera Wang and Charles Frederick Worth. Pieces on show include those worn by Dita Von Teese for her marriage to Marilyn Manson, and outfits worn by Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale for their wedding day.
The lighting design by Studio ZNA offers a high contrast scheme with Precision Lighting’s spotlights precisely focused on the luxurious gowns to highlight the exquisite details within the fabrics. The Evo X11 LED fixtures contain 20º optics; specified to ensure the gowns are well-lit, whilst preserving the high impact environment which ensures the pieces have a particularly eye catching intensity and prominence.
Precision Lighting’s Pico Zoom, with tool-less adjustable beam technology, allows for flexible lighting design and ensures that lighting for all future exhibitions can be easily adjusted to suit without the need for new fixtures.
The exhibition remains at the V&A until March 2015 and offers a panorama of fashion over the last two centuries.
The Victoria and Albert Museum has taken the unusual step of siting a retail outlet off-site,combining a bookshop and bar to create a venue where customers can socialise before buying from its range of 1,000 tomes on fashion and design. The V&A Reading Rooms on Kensington’s Exhibition Road is small and intimate. Its rooms retain their original high ceilings, cornices and bay windows and yet its interior design by David Collins Studio also incorporates contemporary features from shelving to the specially designed lighting.
DHA Designs specified two large custom-made suspended lighting rings for two of the Ceramics Galleries at the V&A, and chose Precision Lighting to manufacture them. Each brushed aluminium ring is 3.4 metres in diameter and supports 24 Microspot C16 spotlights on Node Monopoints. Tiny individual transformers are concealed in the low-profile structure. The rings illuminate an arc of display cases in each gallery, and the spotlight positions had to be aligned carefully with the ceiling fixings to ensure that the light was perfectly directed on the exhibits.
DHA Designs also specified custom Microspot C16 fittings with LED lamps on low voltage track for the cabinet display lighting in the Jewellery Gallery. The track was mounted inside a special housing, cantilevered away from the cabinet. The body of the Microspot C16 fitting was lengthened slightly to accommodate the LED lamp, and all parts were finished in black powdercoat.
Precision Lighting also supplied 108 Microspot C16 fittings with a custom base to be fitted to the linear fluorescent systems running down each side of the galleries. These were supplied direct to the fluorescent manufacturer and delivered to site as an integral part of the luminaire.
Lighting Force was commissioned to design and supply all the luminaires for the flagship UGG® Australia fashion store at west London’s Westfield shopping centre. The store’s interior features a Zebrano wood raft running down the centre of the ceiling and supporting angled canvas sails. This gave Precision Lighting’s in-house developers a complex technical challenge since the raft could not be used to support the lighting.
Precision Lighting worked closely with lighting designer Lighting Force to create a wholly-custom suspension system for Basis Track running 82 Rotor spotlights. The system was suspended 2.3 metres from the concrete ceiling, allowing the fittings to protrude through the gaps between the sails. The special rubbed bronze track had suspension points every two metres between rafts: far greater than usual but support rods between the track and suspension structure gave the system additional strength to prevent sagging, while the suspension detail itself was designed with a tall vertical cross-section to give it extra strength. The suspension system’s design took into account variations in ceiling height as well as making it easier to install. Similar systems have since been installed at UGG® Australia Covent Garden and, more recently, UGG® Australia Manchester, in conjunction with Into Lighting.
The Titanic Belfast immediately became one of the city’s main tourist and cultural attractions when it opened in 2012, the centenary of the historic ship’s launch. The lighting design created for the museum by Sutton Vane Associates uses subdued lighting levels and differences in colour temperature as part of the narrative that unfolds as visitors move around the building from zone to zone.
The visitor’s journey through the museum is a crucial part of the experience. Low levels of light in the atrium create an atmosphere and help prepare the eye for the dark exhibition areas. Precision Lighting’s Evo LED spotlights provide discreet, accurately focused illumination in the circulation spaces and on the graphic displays, helping to guide and inform along the way.
Precision also provided custom luminaires for the walkways on levels five and six of the architecturally stunning building’s banqueting and ‘pre-function’ spaces, enabling staff to work in comfort and safety while avoiding any glare that might interfere with guests’ views over the city. More than 100 Precision Evo LED spotlights were installed together with 40 minimal Pico LED spots and 40 custom luminaires.
All Precision Lighting lockable fittings share design features that make them ideal for use in museums and galleries, including full rotation in pan and tilt and a wide range of optics and accessories easily selected using Precision Lighting’s own product finder website technology.
Located at Granary Square, King’s Cross, the Lighterman is a new public house and restaurant offering stunning views over Regent’s Canal across three floors, that has been successfully lit with Precision luminaires.
The Lighterman is named in homage to the workers who operated the lighters, a type of flat-bottom barges, through London’s barges and canals during the 19th Century; a perfect name given the gorgeous scenery offered by the venue by its close proximity to the waterside.
The Lighterman, the third restaurant from developers Open House, offers a relaxed ambience where all-day dining can be enjoyed by patrons, with breakfast, lunch and dinner menus carefully crafted by chef Diego Cardoso.
Working closely with interior designer Coote and Bernardi, Precision were entrusted to deliver a lighting scheme that offered subtlety, flexibility and aesthetic cohesion.
As the three floors are furnished with pale timber floors, exposed concrete and bare brickwork, the Lighterman required a lighting solution that co-ordinated with this stylistically. Precision’s low-voltage Basis Track provided the perfect system for architectural integration. With a slight and elegant profile, the track could be recessed into shallow ceiling troughs within the timbered ceiling.
Despite being cast in shadow, the Basis Track track was also finished to harmoniously match the rich wooden tones; machined from premium brass and finished to a dark rubbed bronze tone. The Basis Track provided a convenient means in which LED fixtures from Precision’s Discus and Pico families could be installed with convenience while maintaining discretion.
The compact Discus 11 luminaires and Pico spotlights were used alternately along the Basis Track; 48 of each in total were delivered across the three floors of the Lighterman. Both the Discus and Pico fittings were colour matched to the track for a cohesive appearance.
Both spotlight families offer the Lighterman advanced features. With bearing aided pan rotation, and a constant torque tilt mechanism, both lockable, the Discus and Pico spotlights could be precisely aimed with confidence during commissioning.
The Discus 11s, with 20-degree optics, provide a perfect fitting for spot lighting the tables throughout the dining areas. The Pico luminaires, offer careful and discreet accent lighting.
As the focus of the Pico luminaires were varied, from decorative furnishings through to framed photographs that nod to the area’s historical and industrial past, the luminaires needed to offer varying distributions. While the standard Pico 1 fitting has a choice of three optics, ranging from a narrow spot to a flood distribution, the Lighterman required more nuanced changes, and opted for the Zoom variant of the Pico family.
The award-winning Pico Zoom features variable beam technology, thanks to a linear slide mechanism that allows the beam to be gradually broadened from a narrow 12-degree spot through to a wider 30-degree beam that allowed the venue to precisely fine-tune the beam requirements for each spotlight.
Additional accent lighting was provided with the use of miniature recessed LED luminaires from the Minimo family, with both Minimo Tilt and Minimo Eye variants being specified for the restaurant. Both recessed fixtures were provided in a rich, black finish to match the décor.
The compact Minimo Tilt variants offered versatility and consistent beam focus, while respecting the interior aesthetic; even at the full 25-degree tilt, the luminaire does not protrude beyond the luminaire. The Minimo Eye variant was chosen for the flexibility it brought to the scheme, with up to 30-degree tilt, and full 360-degree pan rotation after installation.
With interchangeable optics in both the Minimo and Discus luminaires, and the variable beam technology of the Pico Zoom, not to mention the smooth pan and tilt mechanisms of the spotlights, the lighting scheme for the Lighterman is one that respects the need for flexibility in the hospitality sector, and provides the restaurant an effective solution that will be continue to offer excellence and precision long after the launch.
