Designed by award-winning architects Long & Kentish, the magnificent harbourside blends with and enhances its surroundings. The exhibitions within were designed by Land Design Studio with Kevin Theobald of London-based Maurice Brill Lighting Design onboard as lighting designer. Although an unconventional-looking building, the museum is fitted for the most part with conventional exhibition lighting equipment, but for two of the galleries, the Dark Gallery and the Daylit Gallery, more sophisticated lighting systems were needed.
The Dark Gallery required a control system capable of co-ordinating the lighting with an AV system, so Theobald specified an ETC Express 250 Lighting Playback Controller (LPC) linked via MIDI show control to the AV system and four racks of Unison dimming and non-dim control. For the Daylit Gallery, Theobald again specified Unison dimming and non-dim control, partly cued by a photocell that is related to the daylight.
Also installed in the two galleries are more than 120 various Source Fours, including 43 special Source Four jr Zooms, modified by Enliten (who supplied and installed all the lighting specials) and custom-made for the Daylit Gallery. These HID luminaires use a 150W metal halide lamp with high output, low power consumption, low running temperature and a lifespan of 9000 hours (which equals one year of continuous running). The luminaires were also coated in a special architectural metallic silver paint finish to match the interior. The conventional exhibition gallery lighting was supplied by Mike Stoane Lighting from Edinburgh.
(Ruth Rossington)
