Lumiere London Illuminates the Capital with White Light

	1.8 London. Photo: Matthew Andrews

Last month, famous landmarks across London were completely transformed with extravagant and colorful lighting displays. These were part of Lumiere London -- a free lighting festival which took place across some of the capital's most iconic spaces. As a complete production solution specialist, White Light was called upon to provide the lighting support for several of the installations.

Taking place from January 14 - 17, Lumiere London was produced by Artichoke and supported by the Mayor of London. The range of spectacular displays included the lighting of Westminster Abbey, a purpose-built Garden of Light in Leicester Square, and even images of A-list actors projected onto BAFTA's headquarters.

White Light was contracted by Unusual Services and White Productions on behalf of Artichoke to provide its support.

Dominic Yates, White Light's project manager, comments: "Transforming some of London's most recognizable landmarks solely through lighting is obviously a very ambitious concept so it was really exciting to be involved with something so unique."

White Light was called upon to provide lighting equipment, project management, and crew to eight of the installations. These were Les Voyageurs (St James Square), Plastic Islands (Trafalgar Square), Elephantastic (Air Street), 1.8 London (Oxford Circus), Sanctuary (Brown Hart Gardens), Spectra-3 (Kings Cross), Diver (Kings Cross), and the Grosvenor Square gardens.

Yates adds: "Each installation was designed by an international artist and had a very specific feel. We wanted to ensure that our support helped them achieve their exact vision. As a result, we deployed a team of 16 freelancers and drew on our extensive lighting range."

To create the various installations, White Light used SGM G-Spots and P5s, Core Lighting Point 30s, ETC Source Four Profiles, and Thomas Par 64 Lanterns. To control the fixtures, White Light used the MA Lighting grandMA2, the ETC Ion console, and the Avolites Pearl. The company also provided IP68 LED strips along with Look Solutions Viper 2.6 smoke machines.

With the festival being located in London, this saw White Light having to create each installation on-site in one of the busiest cities in the world. Yates comments: "This project was unique in the sense that we were working with some of London's most recognizable landmarks hence they were always busy and sometimes extremely crowded. It was also a very limited timeframe as we only had a week to set everything up. This meant we had to use all the time we had efficiently in order to deliver each installation on schedule."

Lumiere London was a huge success and attracted more than one million visitors. Yates states: "This was a brilliant project as it demonstrated how a large city such as London could be completely transformed through creative lighting. The feedback we received was fantastic, as was seeing all of our hard work showcased and embraced by so many different people."