Rotterdam, Or Anywhere

Held in Rotterdamn’s Ahoy, PLDC 2019 brought together the international lighting design community for a three-day discussion on all things lighting.

Following its successful expansion into the Far East in Singapore last year, PLDC returned to Europe for 2019. This time hosted in the beautiful city of Rotterdam, Netherlands, the conference once again welcomed representatives from the global lighting design community to network, share ideas, and speculate on the future of the industry.

With a motto of Merging Masterminds, chosen to encourage discussion on, and the implementation of, new ways of cooperating on architectural projects, the conference hoped to inspire reflection and discussion among its 1,500 delegates.

Over the course of a week, the event offered a diverse array of interesting and educational talks across four conference areas. These were broken down into presentations on Lighting Application Case Studies, Professional Practice Issues, Philosophy & Debate, and Office & Retail.

Further to this, the final day of the show featured a series of presentations that formed the conclusion of The Challenge, a talent promotion project in the form of a young designers speaker competition, divided into four rounds. The goal for the project was to encourage more students and recent graduates to interact with each other and with experienced professionals - their coaches - and become a more accepted part of the lighting design community. Participants of this year’s Challenge included: Ece Ozerdem, Jennifer Tomkins, Valeria Bencardino, Katia Kolovea, Jessica Collier and Svetlana Degtiareva.

Elsewhere, highlights from a packed schedule of presentations included keynote speaker Janet Echelman, an American sculptor and ‘fibre artist’, who creates vast, otherworldly sculptures from materials such as atomised water particles, fishnets, and engineered fibre that is fifteen times stronger than steel. During a fascinating keynote presentation, Echelman walked attendees through her nonlinear educational path - after graduating from Harvard College, she lived in a Balinese village for five years, then completed separate graduate programmes in Painting and Psychology - and highlighted some key examples from across her impressive portfolio.

Meanwhile, Jonathan Rush of Hoare Lea led an interesting discussion on the ever-expanding role of lighting designers, examining how, with the growing knowledge of how light impacts wellbeing and the environment, lighting designers are now also “custodians of the planet”, “psychologists of light”, experience designers, researchers and innovators.

One of the most well-attended talks of the first day came from Sharon Stammers - one half of Light Collective, and c0-founder of the Women in Lighting initiative. Here, she discussed the reasons for forming such a movement, opening up on her own experiences within the lighting industry, and inviting discussion on the subject, hoping to inspire more attendees to become involved with the project.

Indeed, the Women in Lighting project was very present across PLDC, with its own dedicated meeting space - hosted in partnership with formalighting. Here, attendees could share their own thoughts on the project, and the women that inspire them. Outside of the show grounds, the first evening saw Women in Lighting host a Pecha Kucha at the Beersnielsen Lighting Designers offices, featuring presentations from eleven international female lighting designers, who each discussed their own lighting journey.

Back at the show, and diverse collection of presentations continued on day two. In the Office & Retail track of talks, Paul Trainer and Paloma Plumed-Martin of Light Bureau hosted a fascinating presentation on the role that light plays in building brands, while Erco’s Thomas Schielke continued this discussion with an in-depth look at the ways in which Apple has expanded and developed its in-store lighting, highlighting global examples of the ways in which lighting has changed in the brand’s most iconic stores.

Michael Grubb Studio’s Greta Smetoniute followed this by highlighting how she has helped to educate retail clients on the importance of a circular economy, and the ways in which lighting design can become a more sustainable process.

Elsewhere, White Arkitekter’s Isabel Villar and William Gagnon of the Northern Centre for Sustainability in Yellowknife, Canada highlighted how they’re working to make the northern Canadian town a Dark Sky City with a lighting scheme that makes residents feel safe, while also showcasing the sky and the aurora borealis.

The final day of presentations welcomed renowned Dutch innovator Daan Roosegaarde, who in a session entitled The Language of Light took delegates on a journey through childhood memories, experiences and the trail of thoughts that led him to create some remarkable light art installations - from Waterlicht to Presence and Gates of Light. Concurrently, Tapio Rosenius and Snøhetta’s Michael Beckert held an experimental lecture that highlighted what design collaboration in the digital age could look like, citing Rosenius’ Scandal Technologies software, and the duo’s ongoing work at the Qasr Al Hokum metro station in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Other highlights from a busy schedule of talks included Mahdis Aliasgari of Lighting Design Collective, who discussed the unique ways in which one can ‘reframe’ design objectives at the concept stage, through a condensed, hands-on, collaborative design workshop format referred to as ‘Foreshadowing’. In other talks, Kevan Shaw of KSLD provided a detailed examination of the ongoing work that his studio has done at the Codega Award-winning Scottish Parliament Debating Chamber, while Kerem Asfuroglu opened up on his recent work in Gambia for The Vessel, and provided a sneak peek into his next project, which will see him attempt to make the Welsh town of Presteigne a Dark Sky Community.

Alongside a packed programme of talks, and a busy trade show floor, PLDC once again hosted a series of Experience Rooms, intended to invite attendees to learn through experimenting or experiencing light and light related issues. This year’s experience rooms included NatürLicht, created by the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Hildesheim and supported by FormLED, Trilux and freedomes; The Dark Art, designed by Chris Lowe, Philip Rafael and Andrés Sanchéz and supported by L&L Luce&Light; The Golden Ratio, by Consuline and supported by LAM32; Illuminated Boxes by Technical University OWL; and Virtual Reality light-refreshment, by Atelier Wegener.

PLDC 2019 culminated, as in previous years, with the Gala Dinner, where the winners of this year’s PLD Recognition Awards were announced. Held at Rotterdam’s Onderzeebootloods, an old submarine factory, the dinner kicked off with a remarkable light show from ACTLD. The first award on the night, the winner of The Challenge, went to Jessica Collier, who was also the recipient of the Best Newcomer award. The Award for Education went to UAE’s The Lighting Institute, while the Award for Research was presented to Dr Taylor Stone, for his postdoctoral research at TU Delft, Netherlands into the value of darkness and environmental ethics, which showed a new perspective and applied interactive methodology to secure strategies for responsible urban lighting using new and emerging technologies. Elsewhere, Casambi won the award for Best Partner in the Industry, while Kerem Asfuroglu won the Award at Large for his work on The Vessel in Gambia. The award for Best Project went to DHA Designs for The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Galleries, while the Best Daylighting Project award went to China’s Usual Studio for the Light Tunnel. Finally, the Lifetime Achievement award was presented to Francesco Iannone and Serena Tellini, who received a standing ovation on collecting the award.

The Gala Dinner concluded with a special announcement that, while it was already known that PLDC 2020 will take place in New York, USA, the next European instalment of the show, to be held in 2021, will take place in Stockholm, Sweden.

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