SEARCH RESULTS

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Public Spaces + Streets < Previous Next > Photos: Steven Brooke Photos: Steven Brooke 1111 Lincoln Road Location Miami Beach, Florida Client Robert Wennett and the City of Miami Beach Team Raymond Jungles, Kimley-Horn and Associates The illumination design for 1111 Lincoln Road–created with Raymond Jungles Landscape Architecture–aspires to be bold, simple, and timeless. The project was inspired by Morris Lapidus’ original vision of an outdoor, tropical setting for shopping, dining, and public gathering and refined by Raymond Jungles’ collaboration with architects Herzog & de Meuron. Architectural Record’s review of the site observes that “the designers refigured the street space as an extension of the pedestrian mall; its urban savanna of tall canopy trees and intricate marble pavements ... [is] symbolic of native ecosystems more than touristic preconceptions--create yet another variant of civic space in Miami.” The plaza is structured by water gardens, planting areas, and varying paving stone stripes. The pavers define pedestrian movement and visibility for the proposed and existing retailers, restaurants, and entertainment venues. For public gatherings, presentations, and events, a central open space is defined by a slightly raised multifunctional platform. Lighting brings the lush vegetation into view during the active evening hours-- emphasizing the hardscape boundaries and curvy planted islands. The low-level illumination accentuates the elegant romantic feeling of the public space area and provides a connection between the shop-window street walls.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Planning + Community < Previous Next > Photos: Keith Jacobs NightSeeing at Myrtle Beach Location Myrtle Beach, California Client Myrtle Beach Downtown Alliance Team NightSeeing Download the Report Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, is planning and designing an Arts and Innovation District. Nighttime designer and urban lighting consultant, Leni Schwendinger was commissioned by the Myrtle Beach Downtown Alliance (MBDA) to conduct her NightSeeing™️ methodology to address nighttime and lighting issues and to set objectives for the future. The mission of NightSeeing™️ is to transform cities at night into safe and welcoming, inspiring and inclusive places. Through close collaboration with MBDA, a customized program including a LightWalk, an invited workshop, stakeholder Q&A, and an open public presentation was delivered. Stakeholders attended Leni’s talk and LightWalk tour where they experienced a fresh perspective on positive and negatively perceived night spaces, their social and physical conditions, and lighting atmospheres. The purpose was to provide a qualitative experience with a vision of the future in mind. Attendees included the Myrtle Beach Mayor, City Council, and City Operations staff. Small business owners and managers participated. Also in attendance were arts and culture representatives such as Coastal Carolina University. Vocabulary and the language of light were expanded to describe how an after-dusk vitalized district would look and feel. As a baseline, during the Envisioning Workshop, attendees identified three objectives for the District’s nighttime design. 1. Identifiable pathways for walking and bikeways that emphasize connection 2. A canvas of light with focal points designed with historic characteristics and innovative features 3. Transformable fun spaces that welcome people at night Significantly the program produced an enthusiastic community cohort through active learning through group walking and workshopping. A launch point has been established for a nighttime masterplan to improve the after-dark environment of the proposed Arts & Innovation District in Myrtle Beach.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Public Spaces + Streets < Previous Next > Photos: Michael Grimm Photography Photos: Michael Grimm Photography Times Square Plaza Reconstruction Location New York, New York Client NYC Department of Design and Construction, NYC Department of Transporation Team Snohetta, Matthews Nielsen Landscape Architects, Thornton Tomasetti, Buro Happold, Wesler Cohen The Times Square Plaza Reconstruction is a case study in how integrative, site-specific illumination mirrors and intensifies planning objectives. The international draw of Times Square is due in part to the role of light.) In Times Square light is an event in and of itself. “Found” light from signage, shop windows, and marquees compete in a pulsing cacophony of sparkle and animation. In late May 2009, a pilot to improve traffic and safety in Times Square by blocking traffic and creating a temporary plaza was completed. In 2010 invited teams competed for the permanent design of the plaza. Leni Schwendinger Light Projects joined with a design team led by architecture firm Snohetta. The team’s multi-media show presentation won over the complex set of owners – a municipal and private-public consortium. Multiple sources of lighting contribute to the nighttime environment of Times Square; commercial advertising billboards, municipal lighting, and endless streams of vehicular traffic. The plaza is bathed rhythmically and chromatically with graphics from direct-view LED and bracketed billboard luminaires. In the end, as happens with many public square projects, because of liability, budget, and other agency priorities, the lighting design was simply achieved by a consolidated streetlight layout utilizing the “New” New York City light pole. Additionally, arising from Schwendinger’s early sketch concepts, bright metal disks were embedded into the paving to reflect the colored commercial light typical of Times Square. Construction was completed in 2017.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Landscape + Parks < Previous Next > Photo: Singleton/SWA Photo: David Lloyd Hunter's Point South Waterfront Park Phase II Location Queens, NY Client NYC Economic Development Corp Team Arup, SWA/Thomas Balsley, Weiss/Manfredi Architects Hunters Point Park South, Phase 2, along Newtown Creek, transforms 5.5 acres of abandoned industrial landscape into a new waterfront park. This park initiated a complex development that includes 5000 units of affordable housing, two schools, and an expanded ferry stop. The landscape features an illuminated, majestic, cantilevered platform. The 30-foot-high platform reaches out over the East River and provides visitors with panoramic nighttime views of Manhattan’s sparkling skyline. There are varied programmed spaces for children and adults which include a playground, picnic terraces, wooden seating areas, and a kayak launch. Each space is appropriately illuminated. Working closely with landscape architects and architects, the illumination design harmonizes with the stunning, natural, riverside habitat bordered by the city and remnants of its industrial past. Soft lighting is integrated and accentuates park furniture, walkways, and edges.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Planning + Community < Previous Next > Photos: Kelli Hayden Photography Photos: Kelli Hayden Photography NightSeeing Third Street Promenade for Downtown Santa Monica Location Santa Monica, California Client Downtown Santa Monica (DTSM), Santa Monica City Planning Department Team NightSeeing Downtown Santa Monica, a Business Improvement District, commissioned Leni Schwendinger to conduct a NightSeeing™ program. The purpose was to provide a qualitative, eye-opening experience of nighttime for stakeholders in the Third Street Promenade during the master-planning process. The event consisted of a lecture, followed by a walking tour, and a workshop on the following day. It was attended by stakeholders, city planners, and select public officials. During an energetic walk, observations were pointed out and noted by the attendees. Discussions centered on beloved features as well as less successful spaces, social conditions, and lighting quality. Instruction was provided to expand attendees’ vocabulary to describe objectives for a newly vitalized area for the hours between dusk and dawn. The workshop attendees generated three objectives for a future lighting and night strategy. Overview: Utilize light as a medium that fosters welcome after dark 1. Further develop community connections by providing public space activities for interaction and authentic community involvement. Explore “surprising” night activities that build anticipation and require discovery 2. Build upon the public art program to define and interpret place identity. Consider alleys and adjacent streets as sites, provide gathering places 3. Develop a range of experiential streetscape activities from subtle and nuanced to bold and spectacular The objectives provide a launch point for a future expanded area lighting masterplan.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Public Spaces + Streets < Previous Next > Photos: Mark Johnson / Civitas Photos: Mark Johnson / Civitas North Embarecadero Vision Plan Location San Diego, Ca Client Port of San Diego Team Project Design Consultants, Civitas, Spurlock Poirier For the San Diego Esplanade, Leni Schwendinger Light Projects’ team designed illumination for the waterfront, gardens, and the Broadway approach. A multi-year project, the Embarcadero’s asphalt surfaces, sad kiosks, and lack of trees set against the magnificent San Diego Bay waters provided bones for revitalization. The project envisioned a gateway to San Diego’s downtown creating a regenerated destination. The consultant team worked with multiple clients, including the business improvement district, Civic San Diego, Port of San Diego, and the City of San Diego. A welcoming urban park interwoven with a working waterfront was the result of the redeveloped masterplan. Following a highly collaborative, public engagement process, Phase 1 of NEVP reclaimed a 1,000-foot long vehicular-oriented throughway and returns the Bay’s water’s edge to thousands of visitors enjoying the many cultural activities found along the water’s edge. The Light Projects’ team collaborated closely with two landscape architects, urban designer, engineers, and public artist. Amid the lush landscape of trees, paths, and plazas, visitors encounter architecturally bold ticket kiosks, artist-designed shade pavilions, and a café. The lighting, graphics, and furnishings recall the craft and heft of the maritime industries. A series of formal garden rooms are defined by the redesigned landscape with seating areas and a complement of custom light poles. An 8-foot-wide water quality band provides visible conveyance and treatment of stormwater to the harbor’s edge. Parallel to the walkway a runnel creates an incised, illuminated line at night. A grand hallway along West Broadway is created by Medjool Date Palm trees planted along the median and sidewalks. The tall, linear palms alternate with Schwendinger’s spiral light-poles, which are 30-feet high and perform both street lighting and up-light the palm tree canopies. At the end of Broadway, the Port Pavilion features Schwendinger’s Tidal Radiance a dynamic, exterior glass, metals, and public-art light wall. All elements of the project, including plant materials, ground surfaces, and furnishing designs, were based on the appropriate scale and durability for the coastal environment.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Infrastructure and Bridges < Previous Next > Photos: Mikaela Baird Parking Garage and Community Space Location Queens, NY Client Urbahn Architects Team Marvel Design, Hunter Roberts Construction Group PRESS Design-Build Institute of America 2024 National Award of Merit The Queens Parking Garage and Community Space, completed in 2023, is the first New York City Department of Design and Construction "design-build" project. Leni Schwendinger Light Projects (LSLP), a Women-owned Business Enterprise, consulted with Urbahn Architects and Marvel Design, headed by Hunter Roberts Construction Group. Beautiful lighting enhances a feeling of safety, care, and identity. The Queens Parking Garage and Community Center’s east facade is punctuated by triangular, metallic fins. The large-scale dimensional wall is a canvas for illumination. Colored light dynamically displayed in the public realm is an LSLP specialty. The team conducted a series of sketching, rendering, technical, spatial, and budgeting exercises to arrive at the final illumination concept: Iridescent Waves. Clients and designers determined that the massive facade would provide a moment of vibrancy for vehicular viewers traversing the adjacent highway tangle, where the Van Wyck Expressway visually converges with Grand Central Parkway. The textured, luminous wall would be a landmark for those drivers, especially during high traffic volumes. For residential tower occupants, it will provide a far-away point of focus. During the evening hours, Iridescent Waves reflects ever-changing hues inspired by the butterfly and bird wings’ “scattered light” chromatic effect. The selected tones are predominantly of the cool spectrum, accented with warm tones. The sequence plays in a loop from sunset until midnight. The programmed composition is bookended by static white providing “white space on the page.” Bookending provides a beginning and end to the luminous color sequence and focuses the viewer’s attention on the light art itself. LSLP provided lighting design for the building exterior. The Community Center entry faces the Queens Borough Hall. The parking entrance faces east toward the highways. With its outdoor stairways and plazas, all sides of the structure present a dynamic profile during the day. After sunset, the eastern side turns iridescent.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Public Art < Previous Next > Photos: Leni Schwendinger Glowing Waterway Location Unna, Germany Client The City of Uma Team Leni Schwendinger Light Projects For an international artists’ program, five artists were commissioned to design site-specific installations using the medium of light to line the streets leading to the town center. During the fall and winter seasons of 2003, Schwendinger created a temporal course - a sensuous environment suffused with liquid-light colors – leading to the central square. Water Street in the town of Unna, Germany, is named for the stream beneath its surface and the path it makes to the Ruhr River. Hell Weg, or Bright Way, an ancient pilgrimage pathway crisscrosses the underground river. Glowing Waterway recalls the flows of water and footsteps that have traversed this path since the 15th century. Utilizing the cartographic lines as a launch point, Schwendinger created a graphic ripple-form as artwork in two ways, formed into a fiber optic strand mounted in mid-air, and recapitulated into a light projection cast onto the paving. Visitors experienced Glowing Waterway as a street and as a river of light, redefined by a festoon of continuous, illuminated, aquamarine lines. The projected forms bathed the visitors as they rested on curvy concrete benches. Playing with perspective - the large-scale of the Hell Weg, the street-scale of Water Street, and the small-scale of a ripple - the installation was perceived on many levels and by many ages, children through adult. Viewed from afar, luminous lines and patterns converged to create a path of sparkling water-light. Up close, Unna residents, workers, and visitors experienced the artwork as a gathering space for conversations and evening fun.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Landscape + Parks < Previous Next > Photo: Sasaki Photo: Leni Schwendinger Light Projects Jiading Parks Location Jiading, China Client Shanghai Jiading New City Development Company Ltd Team Sasaki The initial design brief for Jiading Park called for a radical transformation. In its existing state, the site was comprised of factories, warehouses, and fallow agricultural fields. The park is made of five Zones such as the fitness zone, community zone, and lake zone. The Zones are counterpointed by five major paths that interweave and interact with a variety of park elements. The lighting mirrored use and character of the paths, augmenting identity and wayfinding. The lighting design echoed the creative material palette and dynamic forms.

Light Projects by Leni Schwendinger is the #1 US based professional lighting studio serving global clients. For over 20 years Light Projects has been designing innovative lighting concepts and providing full-service lighting designs that optimize city, urban, and public spaces. Experts in both day and nighttime light experiences, resulting in spectacular creative visions with light offering safety, beauty, and sustainability. Planning + Community < Previous Next > Photos: Guthrie Photography Photos: Guthrie Photography Water Above Water Location Forth and Clyde Canal, Glasgow, Scotland Client Glasgow 1999, British Waterways Team Leni Schwendinger Light Projects “As part of Glasgow’s 1999 City of Architecture and Design initiative, the Maryhill Locks were the focus of a public art project. Coordinated by American lighting designer, Leni Schwendinger, Water Above Water temporarily transformed the locks and Kelvin Aqueduct into a magical, illuminated landscape. A sea of luminous blue, green and aquamarine floodlighting dissolved and animated the stern, hand-hewn stone of the aqueduct’s buttresses and arches.” Excerpt from “Delight”, Architectural Review, December 1999. The year-long festival reiterated Glasgow's tradition of involving communities in the process of redefining their environment. Leni Schwendinger was commissioned by Independent Public Arts in Edinburgh. She aspired to "go where the people live", with an art installation of local Scottish significance that also resonated on an international scale. Water Above Water, a Sublime Floating Landscape was both a temporal art installation and a community-engaged “happening”. Conceived and designed to draw both local and international audiences to the 1,000-foot configuration of landmarked locks and aqueducts in North Glasgow's Maryhill, Water Above Water 's mixage of art, engineering, and illuminations celebrated the Forth & Clyde Canal's visible landscape and invisible industrial heritage--creating an opportunity to reflect the achievements of Glasgow's industrial past Conceived and designed to draw both local and international audiences to the 1,000-foot configuration of landmarked locks and aqueducts in North Glasgow's Maryhill, Water Above Water 's mixage of art, engineering, and illuminations celebrated the Forth & Clyde Canal's visible landscape and invisible industrial heritage--creating an opportunity to reflect the achievements of Glasgow's industrial past. Water Above Water ‘s three artistic elements were: illumination of the Forth & Clyde Canal's landscape and towpath; locally-made floating constructions scaled from miniature to life-size; and light-suffused colors onto the Kelvin Aqueduct's 400-foot-by-70-foot, rusticated-stone and buttresses in the valley below. Viewers of Water Above Water were invited to stroll through an unforgettable landscape of natural and constructed experience, while British (now Scottish) Waterway’s lockkeepers operated the lock-gates so the canal waters rose and fell in a timed sequence. Artist Leni Schwendinger instigated local involvement, which emanated from the neighborhood center’s community art and kayaking classes. Following the public artist’s design brief, student artists developed an elementary school curriculum that entailed building papier-mâché water-creature floats. An architect and professional artist group also interpreted the design brief with abstract silvery sculptures. The kayakers put the floats in place. Additionally, electric model-ship makers from east Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Park arrived to float their battleships during the installation.