Prize(s) Honorable Mentions
Company Atelier Lights
Lead Designers Principal Designer: Nirmit Jhaveri
Other Designer's names Yagnesh Mistry, Neha Mevada, Roshni Rao, Shuja Mehdi
Client HCP Design Planning and Management
Photo Credits HCP - Umang Shah, Vis-a-vis
Other Credits Architecture: HCP, Electrical contractor: Adishwaram, Civil contractor: PSP
Completion Date December 2022
Project Location Varanasi, India
Entry DescriptionRedevelopment of Kashi Vishwanath Temple corridor connects holy river Ganga to the temple of Lord Shiva-Vishwanath. Lighting of the temple, ghat and the connecting corridor with its facades was to be done keeping in mind economy, practicality, maintenance, and a uniqueness. The project is the part of redevelopment that upgrades the ancient infrastructure in the oldest living city of India. Our concept was to have a calm, meditative atmosphere in the ghats and resplendent celebrations in the temple. At one end there is a celebration and on the other end there is a sorrow of death/ celebration of passage to a new life. Our concept celebrates this contrast by employing simple color contrast to important elements at two ends of this urban corridor. Temple premise is lit with cool color and river bank with Amber to establish association with Blue throated God and tradition of immersing oil lamps in river. Corridor is wall washed with tunable white lights that gradually connects Amber color lit riverbanks to the Blue temple structure. The journey is made interesting with the image projection of various Avatars of Lord Shiva so a long passage can be made feel short with interesting stories. Public plazas have custom made pillars of light and catenary lights to allow masses without obstructions. Overall solution caters to contrasting demands of meditative yet celebrative.
Sustainability ApproachThe urban project of this nature always demands for most durable yet economical solution. It needs to be exemplary in terms of ecology and energy consumption. The tidal variation and 12m submersion of some fixtures were other challenging factors. Hence we planned the entire solution employing the best of industry products that can withstand this special conditions. We have chosen lighting concepts of wallwashing and masked gobo projection with precise optics to light the historic and new facade to controll light pollution and light tress pass. Kept most of the luminaires out of the reach of people and near to target surface to minimizes wear and tear and vandalism while increases energy efficiency . Focused on vertical illuminance and strategic accentuation of facades reduces energy consumption as well as allows for celebration of old and new architecture.
