Let There Be Uplights
April 1, 2005
Great homes require great lighting—it can make or break the mood. A lighting
consultant should be on hand in the early stages of designing your
home; they
can ensure that your collections shimmer and help you avoid
any rewiring, which
can be expensive and damage any specialized wall
finishes. Both Sally Storey,
director of Lighting Design International
and chairman of John Cullen Lighting
in London, and Francesca Bettridge
of Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design
in New York, started
working in lighting design in the 1980s, and both are
leading
international experts ready to share their expertise.
“To me,
lighting works most successfully
when you see the contrast of what’s lit and
what isn’t,” says Storey,
who gained a scholarship in architecture at Bristol
University, and
there developed a passion for windows, daylight and the question
of how
to get light into a building. Storey established Lighting Design
International in 1986 to provide creative lighting for private clients,
corporations (BP headquarters, the British headquarters of Chase
Manhattan Bank
and Lord’s Cricket Ground), museums and hotels (One
Aldwych, Chan-cery Court
Spa, Sandy Lane in Barbados and the Grande
Bretagne in Athens).
For
interiors, Storey likes to layer her
lighting, playing with shade and
silhouettes, and building up a picture
with lots of discreet elements to create
a contemporary look.
“Sometimes overscaling things works dramatically well,” she
says. “When
you are working with a period building, you can’t just drill into
the
cornices, plasterwork and paneling, so I light the furniture as much as
possible. I might have freestanding panels with recesses that I can
light, and
from which I can hang perhaps a series of small pendants.”
Highlighting
architectural elements to achieve a dramatically
modern look in an interior is
one of Storey’s favorite techniques, and
staircases are a particular favorite.
She might place floor lights or a
click strip under the stairwell, then
illuminate each step with low
inset side lights, or a stair rail as it winds
upward.
For
bathrooms, Storey uses soft light, but again layered to create
pockets
of interest. “I like halo lighting for mirrors, which comes from behind
the frame,” she says. “And then because a face looks best lit from the
side, I
might add click strips in the inside of the mirror frame.” For
exteriors, Storey
is a fan of uplighting and the aptly named “up-down”
lighting where light fans
both up and down a facade. She likes to throw
light up into the leaves of
architectural plants, such as palm trees,
and to highlight terra-cotta pots that
frame an entrance.
Cline
Bettridge Bernstein in New York, headed by
Francesca Bettridge, has an
impressive string of awards to its name. Since
establishing the company
with the late Carrol Cline in 1985, Bettridge and
her team of 23 have
worked with America’s top architects, from Robert A.M. Stern
to Peter
Marino, Gensler, Andrew Berman Architect, Cesar Pelli & Associates,
and Cook & Fox Architects.
CBB projects have included
the
environmentally friendly Bank of America building at One Bryant
Park, the Santa
Fe Opera and the Clinton Memorial Library. Luxury
goods clients in New York
include Christie’s and Cartier. CBB’s
reputation for versatility, reliability
and innovation means the
company is sought after by private clients as much as
corporate
ones.
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