LIT Lighting Design Awards announces winners of the fifth edition

Winners for the fifth global LIT Lighting Design Awards have been announced, recognising and celebrating the comprehensive efforts of talented international lighting product designers, lighting designers, lighting manufacturers, lighting design firms, as well as students from world over. With 78 extensive categories represented, the LIT Awards presents itself as one of the most comprehensive lighting design competition, uniting creativity, quality, utility, and innovation, since their inception in 2017. The winners receive the prestigious LIT trophy, extensive publicity showcasing their designs and products to an international audience, and more.

The awards are assembled by the Farmani Group and most recently joined the 3C Group as the sister initiative of the IDA International Design Awards, which has been commemorating smart, multidisciplinary and sustainable design since 2007. 3C Awards recognises and supports talented designers through awards, press, media exposure, events, and exhibitions.

The design awards called for entries from all over the world, from professionals and students alike. Each submitted design was carefully evaluated by a grand jury panel comprising experienced and prominent designers, academics, professionals, press members, entrepreneurs, and key leaders in the lighting, interior design and architectural industry such as Ellen Kathrine Hansen, Aalborg University Copenhagen, M.Arch., MAA, Ph.d., Associated Professor, Head of Lighting Design, Dept. of Architecture (Denmark), Katia Kolovea, Archifos Founder & Art Director (United Kingdom) and Amit Gupta, Founder and Editor-in-Chief, STIR (India), and many more.

A look at the Grand Prize winners:

Lighting Design of the Year

Acropolis of Athens and Monuments by Eleftheria Deko & Associates

An Emmy award-winning lighting studio, Eleftheria Deko and Associates specialises in architectural lighting design, stage lighting, and event lighting. On September 20, 2020, the new lighting of the Acropolis and its monuments, funded and supported by the Onassis Foundation, was unveiled to the world. The multidisciplinary team approached the heritage lighting of the Acropolis of Athens in Greece, one of the most recognisable monuments of the world, with an aim to highlight the timeless beauty of its architecture and sculptures, the whiteness of the Pendelikon marble against the robust Sacred rock, and the heroism of its fortification walls.

“We achieved the differentiation by the use of different focusing angles, differentiation of colour temperatures, and of light intensity. Lastly, our lighting vision was to make the site look outstanding at night from multiple directions both up close and from afar, and bring new life into the monuments of the Acropolis,” relayed their design statement.

Lighting Product Design of the Year 2021

Opteris Chandelier by R3 Consulting Engineers

The lighting and furniture design studio has garnered acclaim for their fixtures that inspire to live loud, which is the case for their Opteris chandelier that pays homage to Tomopteris, a deep-sea creature, appearing also as a swirling Chinese dragon or a coiling serpent, unfurling in graceful motion. Composed of two parallel frames interwoven with 104 unique cherry wood fins which interlock on the frames, the winning fixture imbibes a unique aesthetic, invoking emotion and creativity. “The frames exude light inward with LED lights which illuminate both the fixture and its surroundings. The design offers a completely asymmetrical and dynamic experience from all angles,” the designers explain.

Emerging Lighting designer of the Year 2021

Immersive Gestures by Congrui Gao

Winner of the Interior Architectural Illumination / Theater Performance Design, designer Congrui Gao from the California College of The Arts guided by instructor Margo Majewska, converts an existing theatre into a performing space that includes fashion shows.

"The concept for my project was inspired by Balenciaga's 2020 fashion show. Each environment is connected through layers of immersive experience. The interior of the performance space is composed of a single strip-shaped LED screen, and the audience will stand along the arcs edges to experience a 360-degree immersive experience. Videos on the screen will actively respond to the fashion clothing, creating a sense of mystery, structuralism, and powerful visual impact. The relationship between the fashion model and the audience will continue to change, instead of maintaining a fixed relationship between the stage and the audience. The entire experience of the fashion show is not a static vision, it is an 'immersive' experience of moving 'gestures' between the audience and performer. Illuminating public space needs to fulfill a wide range of needs. The design process for this project was structured around five layers of light that address these needs and uses these layers as a guide for making lighting design decisions,” says the student based in San Francisco.

Emerging Lighting Product Designer of the Year 2021

Trinity by Jay Burnett

A student at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Burnett’s Trinity chandelier is designed to celebrate groups of “three” in both materiality and form. Featured as a stand, or hang, the project specifically suits dramatic focal points. “Transitions between the central concrete hub, the brushed aluminum branches, and the light within those branches are seamless; and when lit the light within each branch becomes a material in its own right as it fills in the negative space,” the designer relays.

“Designing any object means more than designing just the finished product; it also includes the development of new processes used to produce that product, and Trinity is no different,” they continue. To produce the product design’s concrete hub, Burnett developed a 3D printed concrete mould which increased re-usability, enabled highly accurate dimensioning, and allowed mounting hardware to be cast directly into the part, in tandem with decreasing cost and machining time, in comparison with reusable silicon or foam mould at this scale.

LIT Lifetime Achievement Awards

Introduced in 2018, the Lifetime Achievement recognise professionals in the lighting industry, “whose contributions over their entire career to the industry are tremendous… The prize is today the highest honour awarded in the lighting design field,” the body claims.

1. Tony Lawrence, Lighting Product Director at Concord Lighting

With a career of over 50 years in lighting product design, Lawrence has been working since April 1969 at Concord Lighting part of the Sylvania Lighting group, designing prodigious products that bring accent lighting to the high streets, art galleries, museums, hotels, and more. He has also set design briefs and evaluated projects for degree students of St Martins School of Art London’s students and at the University of Sussex.

“Lawrence has won numerous prizes with Concord’s innovative range of LED luminaires starting with the Red Dot Award in 1996 for the Torus 100 Low volt spotlight range, followed by the FX Interior Design Awards in 1999 for the Torus 35W CDMT spotlight. In recent years, the Beacon Muse won four lighting industry awards mandating a ‘clean sweep’ and expert endorsement for high performance and beautiful products. The Stadium spotlight in 2010 won the prestigious Red Dot award. This was followed in 2013 when Concord Glace won the Best Interior Luminaire at the Lighting Design Awards and been a finalist at the Lux Awards and the FX Awards, whilst 2014 saw industry recognition of Concord’s Officelyte with new intelligent Sylsmart technology,” LIT Awards relay.

2. Craig A. Bernecker, Professor of Lighting Design at Parsons School of Design and Founder of the Lighting Education Institute

Spanning four decades in lighting, Bernecker has had the opportunity to play a pivotal role in the development of two highly regarded lighting education programs, at Penn State University and at Parsons School of Design, The New School. “Craig’s contribution to Lighting Education is tremendous, as an Educational Facilitator for the LIGHTFAIR International, Professor of Lighting Design and Director at Parsons School of Design, The New School, New York and Founder of The Lighting Education Institute as well as his involvement in professional societies such as the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America (IES), the International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD) and the International Commission on Illumination (CIE),” states LIT Awards.

Spotlight Prize 2021

The LUCI Association

Introduced in 2020, the Prize puts the spotlight on an organisation, association, project, or initiative that carries out remarkable work for its community and has a major contribution to the lighting industry.

The international network of cities on urban lighting created in 2002 at the initiative of the City of Lyon (France), LUCI is a non-profit organisation that brings together over 70 member towns and cities from across the globe employing light as a tool for social, cultural, and economic development. It also includes over 50 associated members from the lighting industry, design agencies, and research institutes.

Also read: LIT Lighting Design Awards announces winners of the sixth edition