Altman attends Harvard Business School
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Designed by the architectural firm William Rawn Associates, Architects, the hall needed a lighting solution that could meet strict acoustic and performance criteria, so they worked with the design firm Theatre Projects who specified PHX 150W LED profile luminaires from Altman Lighting.
“This was a new construction project and our first time working with the Harvard Business School,” says Steven Rust, Theatre Projects’ lighting designer. “In an atmosphere where people needed to hear each other clearly throughout the hall, the criteria from the acoustician was that the lighting had to be ideally convection-cooled, or near-silent. One thing we have learned over the years is that there really is no such thing as a silent fan, so we needed to find a solution that was completely convection-cooled.
“Another challenge to the design was that the room needed to be able to function in many different configurations and be able to accommodate multiple audience sizes,” continues Rust. “First and foremost, it’s a lecture hall, but then it can also be set up in five different configurations, so the lighting needed to be able to adjust as well. I have been aware of the PHX 150W for a few years now, and the convection-cooled aspect of its design, along with its performance capabilities, really made it stand out from other fixtures on the market.”
With the lighting solution in place, the design continued to take shape as all of the technological elements came together, including an expansive audio system. Needing silence in the room in order not to distract from the conversation at hand, the PHX 150W luminaires were up to the challenge.
Now open, the new 1,000-seat lecture hall recently hosted a dedication ceremony and its inaugural educational symposium.
(Jim Evans)
