Interview with Lighting Designer, Bob White
I met lighting designer, Bob White, when he taught my lighting class at The College for Creative Studies. He is a graduate of the school and returned to teach us about the creative possibilities that designing with light offers. Bob is an amazingly gifted designer, and his enthusiasm for his field is infectious.
His design firm, Illuminart, works on everything from churches to airports, from residential to water parks. His work sends him and his partners around the world. They’ve completed projects in the US, the Caribbean, Central America, Australia and the Far East. Bob was kind enough to talk to me about his passion for lighting and to pass along some advice on how to create drama with light in our own homes.
DH: You work in a very specialized field of design. What makes lighting so vital?
BW: On a basic level, we help the interior designer and the owner realize their vision. In a residential situation the owner might have an idea of how they want the place to look. Good lighting can help achieve their vision. More specifically, regardless of the materials used on a project, lighting will show them in their best or worst light. For example, we can work with a faux stone material and light it so that it looks like real stone. On the other hand, you can buy the best, most expensive marble imported from the far ends of the world, but if it’s not lit well it can literally look like plastic. I’ve seen that happen.
DH: Almost everyone has heard about ambient lighting and task lighting. But I don’t think most people think anything about lighting except to find a nice lamp and put it on the table next to the sofa. How can a Do-It-Yourselfer go about doing their own lighting plan for a room?
BW: When anyone is thinking about lighting they need to take the whole picture into account. We have to think about how the room functions and how the space is used throughout the day. Certainly we’ll need more light at night. But, the space may be used differently at night. Also, we have to think about how can we use the qualities of the room itself to best distribute light. A ceiling fixture may provide enough ambient light for a room. But if the ceiling has some beautiful detail, attention should be paid to that or the detail is lost.
DH: What particular things we should pay attention to?
BW: There are three things a person should think about – quality of light, quantity and accent lighting. There are two aspects to quality. First, what is the quality of illumination? It shouldn’t have a lot of glare. Then, there’s the quality of the fixtures, such as downlights [cans, or recessed lights] for ambient lighting. The glare the fixture creates, the trim rings, even the housing itself can vary greatly. Skip Home Depot and go to a good lighting showroom. They‚Äôll let you know if you’re buying a quality fixture. Or, go to other people‚Äôs homes or restaurants where you like the lighting and ask what they used. Now we come to quantity. The trick is to balance ambient and accent lighting.
DH: By accent lighting you mean the lighting that adds some drama?
BW: Yes, this is what makes a room look beautiful. It’s easiest to plan the accent lighting first and fill in with ambient light second. Start with the fun stuff.
DH: How can we add drama?
BW: Organize the switching controls and dimmers so that you can adjust the light. Again, a good lighting showroom can help you make sure you have enough light. But, this is where you need to take a good look at the elements of the room itself. What can you accent? For example, a hallway will have some downlights on dimmers for ambient light. But adding one accent light on the wall at the end of the hall can set off the whole space. Don’t feel driven to accent light everything. Just popping one wall can make a huge difference. You can also add drama by thinking in the vertical plane, not just the horizontal plane. Use rope light to accent a cove ceiling.
DH: Popping a wall? You mean just a plain wall?
BW: You can do this with some adjustable downlights that throw a wash of light onto the wall. That can add a lot of drama. But don’t narrow the overall light too much or there won’t be enough light. Don’t fall into the trap of accent lighting everything. Choose one thing – even the ceiling – and accent that. You can also use uplights to wash a wall.
DH: Would you approach lighting a contemporary home differently than a traditional one?
BW: If we think of traditional rooms, we think of walls with wallpaper or wood detailing. So, we’re lighting a lot of texture. In contemporary homes the walls are typically smooth, no texture ‚Äì more planes. So, we might do a scallop of light in a traditional home versus a smooth wash of light in a contemporary. I’d use the art as the opportunity to spot that.
DH: Are there any special tricks to lighting a face and the body? I’m thinking of dressing rooms, where all women want to look good. J. Crew does a horrible job with this. They have giant, glaring downlights and no accents. It’s like when you hold a flashlight up to your chin only in reverse. You can’t see what the clothes look like.
BW: Lighting a face is a question of balance. Things that are really task driven, like dressing rooms, have to start with the ambient light and then the accent lighting. Glare can be a big problem. And you need the accent light, like a sconce, to balance the light coming from above. But in most lighting projects, we start with the accents.
DH: What’s the biggest mistake people make with lighting?
BW: I think it’s forgetting about accent lighting. I remember this high-end housing development where they’d used some really exotic paneling in the houses and didn’t bother to light it. A lighting distributor did the lighting and they used a factory approach. It was an ocean of 8-inch downlights.
DH: You’re up to date on the latest technology. What’s the coolest thing coming out now?
BW: LEDs definitely are the coolest thing around now. They aren‚Äôt the solution for everything, but they‚Äôre very cool. The things you can do with them are limitless and they come in so many colors. They‚Äôre still very expensive, but they’re coming down in price. We’re currently working on a resort in the British virgin Islands. We‚Äôre using all LEDs to light the exterior. The resort is off by itself, so we don‚Äôt have to fight street lights. That means we can start with a much lower quantity of light and do something dramatic with a fraction of the energy.
DH: Tell me about a project you’re particularly proud of.
BW: Believe it or not, I’m really proud of the work I did relighting the Detroit tunnel. [The tunnel that runs under the Detroit River between Detroit and Canada.] The roadway is designed so that the driver goes up an incline and then right out of the tunnel into blinding sunlight. That was causing a lot of accidents because the drivers didn’t have a chance for their eyes to adjust. I added a gradual increase of light to acclimate them before they left the tunnel. It actually saved lives and I’m really proud of that.
DH: What are you working on now?
BW: I think I mentioned the resort in the BVI’s. We’re working on another hospitality project in Northern Michigan, a casino in Texas, and residential work throughout the country. We‚Äôre even doing an exotic dance club.
DH: What are your favorite lighting websites?
BW: Lightsearch.com is a great one for more commercial things. [A more experienced DIY-er can find some great things here.] I also like LightingUniverse.com. They’re great for hospitality and residential and they give you pricing.
DH: I know you’re hopping a plane tomorrow for an overseas flight, so thanks for giving me the time for this interview.
BW: It’s been my pleasure.
One Response to “Interview with Lighting Designer, Bob White”
Avatars are randomly assigned unless you get your own
Great interview! It was really informative.