Illuminated River

By Sarah Gaventa

Sarah Gaventa is the Director of the Foundation, an Honorary Fellow of the Landscape Institute and a curator and public realm champion. She was the Director of CABE Space at the Commission for Architecture and Built Environment.

The ‘dark river’ at the heart of London is being brought to life entirely with light.

This spring, the lighting of an additional five bridges in the Illuminated River artwork will create the world’s longest public art commission. The Blackfriars, Waterloo, Golden Jubilee, Westminster and Lambeth Bridges will be illuminated by New York-based artist Leo Villareal’s subtle display of slowly moving light sequences, joining the four bridges already lit in 2019 – London, Cannon Street, Southwark and Millennium.

Illuminated River (IR) will transform the Thames at night, offering a cultural experience that is open air, free to view and accessible to all. With no ticketing or queuing, this monumental installation provides the public with the opportunity to enjoy the architectural beauty of London’s bridges, and gain an understanding of their relationship with the river flowing beneath them. Spanning the cultural, financial and political stretches of the Thames, the launch marks the culmination of five years’ work by the Illuminated River Foundation. The installation is the result of a collaborative initiative bringing together an American artist, Leo Villareal, and a British architectural practice, Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands, plus 18 specialist teams. Illuminated River’s extensive network of more than 50 stakeholders and project partners includes six London boroughs, public bodies Transport for London and Network Rail, as well as organisations such as Historic England, the London Wildlife Trust and the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

Illuminated River is the longest public art project in the world at 3.2 miles in length (calculated across both sides of each bridge), and in a normal year will be seen by over 90 million people. It will last for at least 10 years and the Foundation will fund all maintenance, replacement and electricity costs.

Funded almost exclusively by donations from four major philanthropists – Arcadia (a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin), the Blavatnik Family Foundation, the Reuben Foundation and the Rothschild Foundation – the ambitious project demonstrates an unprecedented level of collaboration across disciplines and a multitude of stakeholders, owners and local authorities. IR is the result of one of the most detailed and extensive pan-London planning processes the capital has ever seen (without an Act of Parliament as Crossrail and Tideway had), with 30 planning permissions and 18 Listed building consents granted. It has been developed in consultation and collaboration with over 50 organisations on and around the river.

We have worked with City Cruises to compile data to create a clearer picture of Londoners’ relationship to their river. Many children living in London have never seen the Thames (1 in 10) and despite the fact it is the biggest “blue” and arguably the biggest public space in London, you cannot “enter” it for free. Therefore, many low income families have never experienced it (or have at least never been on the river itself). We have created very cheap guided boat tours in partnership with Thames Clippers (the same price as commuting) and free boat tours for local communities to help reconnect them with the Thames – but there is still much work to be done to make the river and its related spaces inclusive for all. We have collaborated with the charity Vocal Eyes, to ensure that those with sight loss will be able to enjoy the artwork through audio description, as a moving and largescale light installation can still be seen and experienced by many people with some form of sight loss.

Our audio guide and map of the first four bridges highlight key sites of historical interest along the south bank. Meanwhile, our collaboration with student composers at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama has produced musical scores inspired by the bridges. These can be downloaded for free from SoundCloud, and they help create a more immersive experience as you wander through the landscape around the Thames.

The first four Illuminated River bridges – London, Cannon Street, Southwark and Millennium – made their debut in 2019 accompanied by a wide programme of engagement. The project was granted UNESCO patronage for its contribution to culture, science, architecture and heritage. Since their launch, the four bridges have been creating an evocative display every evening, from dusk until 2.00am. The previous lighting schemes on the London and Southwark bridges were lit from dusk to dawn, but we questioned this, feeling it was more responsible to turn them off after the bustle of the city ends, bringing darkness to the Thames, whose name comes for the word “Tamesis”, meaning “dark river”. Rather than flooding the river itself with light, we want to focus it on bridges revealing themselves, their relationship to one another and to the neighbourhoods they connect on either bank.

Smart LED technologies will replace outdated and inefficient lighting on the bridges, providing a more sustainable solution for lighting the Thames at night. By removing metal halides and halogens, and employing efficient LEDs with custom fittings, the new scheme reduces both energy consumption and light spill onto the river, providing a better environment for Thames flora and fauna. Illuminated River has refocused attention not only on the bridges, but also on surrounding public spaces, encouraging more people to come and enjoy the riverside areas and views of the river at night. In order for them to have the best experience, we worked with the local authorities to assess their public spaces and their own lighting, to look at reducing its brightness where appropriate, and to harmonise colour temperatures to make a warmer and people-friendly cityscape.

We also noticed the lack of public seating in some areas, and the increase of retail, where in order to sit and enjoy the artwork you would have to buy a drink. We wanted this to be a really inclusive project, so we identified sites to install new high quality public seating, and Marshalls kindly donated wooden benches which have been very popular.

Given there are so many different landowners along the riverbanks, and how hard it is to identify who they are, it took us over a year to track them down and gain permissions – about the same time it took to gain 30 planning consents. We also worked with the BFI and the local booksellers to install amenity lighting under Waterloo bridge that would work for both their needs. We created an app which allows the booksellers to turn the levels up when they are in situ and the BFI to turn them down when they have gone. There are many other areas along the riverbank where a more connected and collaborative approach to the lighting would greatly improve the public’s experience of the nightscape.

Mindful of the potential environmental impact, in planning this project, we commissioned the first luminance studies of the central Thames. When this was completed by Atelier Ten, we were shocked by the results. Albert Bridge chucks out as much light as a motorway, and many of the lighting schemes pumped direct light into the Thames (which our project removes). Many buildings are lit well over recommended limits too. This prompted us to instigate a lighting project with Centre for London and approach other partners to join us (GLA, City of London Corporation and Cross River Partnership). Centre for London’s report ‘Lighting London’, which reviews public lighting approaches in London, will share its findings in March 2021, which will hopefully encourage more debate and sharing of best practice around the light curation of our cityscape and how we might reduce and manage light levels. At the moment, the London we see at night is mainly what facility managers want us to see: our historic environment disappears, dominated by over-lit empty office and commercial buildings competing with each other. We have also conducted bat and bird surveys of the riverside areas. Data from all of these studies has been made available as a public resource. We hope they will increase understanding and inform the way we all think about and use the areas around the Thames.

Cannon Street Bridge dates from 1868, yet it is often overlooked and has never been illuminated before as it is has been seen more as infrastructure than architecture.

© James Newton

The river is currently London’s least-used transport artery, and commuting on it drops after dark. We hope Illuminated River will encourage travel along and across the river at night, and encourage people to walk across the bridges instead of taking a bus or a cab, in line with TFL’s plan to make London a more walkable city.

The installation of the second phase of the project continued throughout the pandemic, which threw new challenges at us every week. Many partners had furloughed staff, there were delays in kit arriving, and staff numbers on site had been reduced to ensure socially distancing, making access difficult and meaning work took longer.

In the midst of the pandemic, the calm and tranquil effects of this openair artwork take on an even greater significance; it encourages Londoners to walk along its length and to pause and take in the beauty of the city. Whilst we hoped Londoners would engage with it, the potential wellbeing importance from their visits (like our parks role during lockdown) had not really been anticipated. It is there for everyone to enjoy when they can. Even in this difficult time, it demonstrates that London continues to be a uniquely creative and innovative capital.

Millennium Bridge. Villareal created a monochromatic artwork which respects and delivers Sir Norman Foster’s original intent to create a blade of light.

© James Newton

London Bridge demonstrated how the Illuminated River smart lighting kit was utilised by the Greater London Authority to create a special New Year’s Eve display replacing the art work for one night.

© Illuminated River Foundation

Southwark Bridge illustrates the aim to paint with light in order to reveal the architecture of the bridge and work with its structure. Hiding the light source was an important objective.

© James Newton

Waterloo Bridge uses a simple line of light to highlight the length of the longest bridge on the Thames, whilst lights underneath reveal its spine which is visible from both banks.

© James Newton

About Leo Villareal The acclaimed American artist Leo Villareal (b. 1967 Albuquerque, New Mexico), a pioneer of LED light sculpture, creates intricate light installations for both gallery and public settings. He came to international prominence through his project, The Bay Lights, which illuminated the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge in 2013. Initially conceived as a two-year display, the popularity of The Bay Lights led it to be transformed into a permanent installation, now an iconic visual element of the San Francisco’s landscape. He focuses on identifying the governing structures of systems and is interested in base units such as pixels and binary code. His installations use custom, artist-created code, which constantly changes the frequency, intensity, and patterning of lights through sequencing.

About Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands Award-winning architects, design consultants and urban planners Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands (LDS) have worked on major projects across London, including the Golden Jubilee Footbridges. The practice has a 25- year relationship with communities and businesses in London’s South Bank, having both created the area’s urban design strategy, and worked with the Coin Street Community Builders to regenerate the area, through the development of co-operative housing and commercial ventures to support new urban realm initiatives.

About the Illuminated River Foundation An independent charity, the Illuminated River Foundation was set up to deliver the major public artwork, Illuminated River. The Foundation has received generous funding from Arcadia (a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin), the Rothschild Foundation, the Blavatnik Family Foundation and the Reuben Foundation. Seed funding was awarded from the Mayor of London’s Office for the initial competition, and from the City of London Corporation for replacing light fittings on London Bridge.

Illuminated River is supported by the Mayor of London and governed by an independent board of trustees chaired by Lord Mendoza, Government Commissioner for Cultural Recovery and Renewal and Provost of Oriel College, Oxford University.

Sarah Gaventa is the Director of the Foundation, an Honorary Fellow of the Landscape Institute and a curator and public realm champion. She was the Director of CABE Space at the Commission for Architecture and Built Environment.

Resources

Research on relationship between Londoners and the river: https://illuminatedriver.london/ discover/londoners-and-the-thames

VocalEyes: https://illuminatedriver.london/ discover/vocaleyes

Audio guide and map: https://illuminatedriver.london/ discover/download-our-newaudioguide-and-map-of-the-firstfour-illuminated-river-bridges

Collaboration with Guildhall School of Music: https://illuminatedriver.london/ whatson/new-music-for-theilluminated-river-bridges-a-liveperformance

Luminance survey: https://illuminatedriver.london/ discover/illuminated-riverspioneering-luminance-survey

Bat and bird survey: https://illuminatedriver.london/ discover/river-thames-breedingbird-assessment

Environmental information: https://illuminatedriver.london/ discover/category/environment

Centre for London report on lighting in the capital: https://www.centreforlondon.org/ publication/lighting-london/