6 minute read
A Beacon of Learning
from Oct/Nov 2025
By Randy Reid
Focus Lighting Transforms Liberty Science Center into a Luminous Landmark on the Hudson
When the Liberty Science Center (LSC) in Jersey City began planning renovations to their aging event space, they weren't intending to create a beacon.
Brett Andersen, principal at Focus Lighting, saw an opportunity. The LSC renovation gave the center the chance to achieve a long-time goal of President and CEO Paul Hoffman: making the science center more visible at night.
“Paul and I had spoken in the past about his desire to make LSC more visible to the millions of people in Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn, as well as the hundred-thousand people that drive by every night on the nearby New Jersey Turnpike. I knew this was our opportunity to create the luminous landmark on the skyline that Paul always wanted, a true “Beacon of Learning.”
Hoffman raised the funds to expand the project’s scope to include the tower’s exterior lighting, allowing Focus Lighting to execute their holistic vision for the nighttime lighting of the future Robert Wood Johnson III Tower and its renovated event facility.
Designing the Arrival
Focus Lighting choreographed the visitor’s journey from the ground up. Guests enter a glass elevator rising through a five-story atrium, where RGBW LED strips outline each window and cast light onto silver-painted elevator shaft walls.
“We tested a lot of paints in our lab and landed on a reflective metallic silver so the light bounces in an interesting way,” Brett said. As the elevator ascends, riders pass luminous frames before emerging into the glass-walled event space with sweeping views of Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty.
Cracking the Pinnacle Puzzle
The greatest challenge was lighting the 50-foot-tall glass pinnacle—the Tower’s crown and event space ceiling. Originally built in 2007, the space became plagued by poor HVAC and intense solar gain. “It would roast up there,” Brett recalled.
Solar film was added to cut heat gain, but it reduced light transmission. Exterior mounting promised brightness but would have been impossible to maintain. Interior mounting was practical but cluttered the view.
Focus designed and prototyped a custom bracket and tube steel system that tied into mullions, with a bent metal shroud concealing SSL linear RGBW fixtures. “The beauty is that guests never see the fixture—it’s tilted up and completely hidden,” Brett said. But the setup left gaps, producing a “broken tooth” effect where fixture lengths didn’t match mullion spacing.
The breakthrough came through collaboration with the glazing team: Diffusion film was layered alongside the solar film. “The diffusion film mounted on the inside of the glass gave us a surface to light, creating a continuous line when viewed from the outside while also eliminating direct reflections of the LEDs in the glass,” Brett said.
Interior Flexibility
Inside the ninth-floor event space, flexibility was critical. Fixtures mounted 25 feet above the floor were impossible to re-aim for each event. Remote-controlled 2700K accents from RCL solved the problem.
“They’re wonderful,” Brett said. “We preprogrammed them for the most common table layouts, making it easy to set up the space. The staff just puts tables where the light is.”
Additional layers included RGBW tape light from Acolyte integrated into toe kicks and soffits, grazing roller shades with color. DMX-controlled battery-operated table lamps from Vondom synced wirelessly with the entire system, offering playful accents. Amerlux downlights and CSL miniature recessed fixtures provided general illumination, while Times Square Lighting supplied emergency floods.
Lighting the Skyline
Outside, RGBW floodlights wash up the lower facade, while linear fixtures highlight the towers upper setbacks. Together with the pinnacle lighting, these layers of light combine to create the luminous beacon on the skyline Hoffman had long sought.
Focus Lighting even reprogrammed the nearby Dino Dig pavilion, (an earlier project of theirs), so its colors harmonize with the tower, creating a unified composition visible from across the Hudson.
A Control System with Confidence
At the heart of the design is ETC's Mosaic control system. “It runs on a time clock,” Brett explained. “If there’s no event, the tower defaults to LSC’s brand colors. But for events, they just hit a button on a custom touchscreen control.”
Focus composed over two dozen ‘light paintings’, each inspired by the beauty of nature, holiday hues, or special-event themes. “The goal was to give the Science Center different looks that were all beautiful, and handle 95% of their needs, so the event staff didn’t have to play lighting designer,” Brett added.
A Trusted Partnership
Focus Lighting’s partnership with LSC spans nearly a decade, from Science on a Sphere to the “Our Hudson Home” exhibit. That trust carried into the tower project, where the design team handled not just design but programming and commissioning.
“From the beginning, LSC has appreciated Focus Lighting’s ability to find opportunities and solutions beyond just the lighting. For this project, it was also about paint, window film, and some creative engineering. That’s what makes it special,” noted Brett.
Legacy of Illumination
The Robert Wood Johnson III Tower is now both a functional event space and a luminous landmark. From programmable façades to flexible interiors, it demonstrates the power of lighting to shape experiences at every scale.
“We really value our relationship with Liberty Science Center and are so happy to help them achieve this long-standing goal” Brett reflected.
FIXTURE SCHEDULE
• SSL Lighting – RGBW Flood Lights, Linear Wall Grazers, Linear Glass Backlighting
• Acolyte – RGBW Tapelight and Channel
• RCL Lighting – Remote-Controlled 2700K Accents
• Amerlux – Recessed Downlights
• CSL – Miniature Recessed Downlights
• Vondom – Battery-operated RGBW Table Lamps
• Times Square Lighting – Emergency Flood Lighting
• ETC – Mosaic Dimmers and Controls
The Robert Wood Johnson III Tower is now both a functional event space and a luminous landmark.
