Private Residence, Manhattan, 2017 The custom flexible lighting system was designed to light the space and art while limiting the reflected light on the glass to preserve the view at night. The lighting assembly was carefully coordinated with the lighting representative, lighting manufacturer, and furnished through many shop drawings coordinated by the distributor. Photo credit: Tirschwell Lighting Design
BEING SOLD TO Instead of DESIGNED FOR? Lighting design and lighting distribution are vastly different. Both are essential to visualizing and realizing a successful project, and each adds a critical value. However, when lighting designers take on product sales, complexities arise. Interior designers are often referenced as a comparison, but the products they furnish are not as entangled in the building’s infrastructure as architectural lighting. Lighting is deeply integrated, requiring coordination across wiring, controls, construction, and multiple trades. Interior designers, strictly considering products they may furnish to the project, often coordinate appointments and finish elements which tend to have a lesser degree of entanglement in MEP, HVAC, structural, or other teams. This makes the interior designer model substantially different. In nearly 27 years of lighting design in New York City,
before adding sales as a component, I can recall only five to ten times when I needed to request order expedition help from reps or manufacturers. In each case, we worked together with the architect, GC, and EC to address the issue as a team and support the client. Once distribution enters the equation, the dynamics shift. General contractors and electrical contractors often become less engaged, particularly under “furnished by owner” arrangements. If they are not being compensated, their incentive to stay involved diminishes, and that burden is largely transferred to the design team. The expectation becomes that the design and distribution company will deliver fixtures outside of standard channels, arriving as if from Amazon. Additionally, traditional electrical distributors also handle and negotiate many things related to the project.
A Deep Dive Into the New IALD Bylaws 32
designing lighting
By DAVID BURYA