Streatham High Road is famous for being the longest high street in the United Kingdom. Architectural lighting has now been used to create a greater sense of place and community for local businesses and society, and breathe new life into the area with the idea of combining its individual elements to light up the Streatham skyline.
Michael Grubb Studio, in collaboration with Pharos partner Architainment, developed a ‘Streatham wide’ lighting concept using a Pharos LPC controller. The remote accessibility of the Pharos operating system allows building owners to have independent control of the lighting on a daily basis, and also allows Lambeth Council to have access during special events to coordinate the entire street.
Linked to a calendar that has been created in partnership with the many communities of Streatham, the buildings on the High Road can celebrate a key religious or social day, commemorate birthdays of local residents past and present, note days of remembrance or simply make people aware of upcoming events.
There are over 100 dates already programmed. The Pharos LPC1 can control over 16 million colours with an endless array of patterns to create a unique sequence of colour or animations in keeping with a designated day. Each building was approached uniquely in design and bespoke details were made to make the lighting both effective and discreet from the view of the road.
Philips ColorKinetics fixtures have been used throughout the five buildings included in the first phase of the project, and the expectation is that the surrounding buildings, businesses and community groups will join the initiative in the future. The scalability of the Pharos system allows for the prospect so that future fixtures and controllers can be easily added without diminishing performance or creating complex programming and maintenance issues.
