Brand communication with light

Creating and maintaining value is the philosophy of Otto Wulff, a construction company with a history starting in 1932 in Hamburg. The company employs around 300 people and conducts business in the sectors of structural engineering, industrial and reinforced concrete construction and the restoration of old buildings.

The company’s subsidiary, Otto Wulff Projektentwicklung (OWP), implements housing construction and commercial projects of various sizes from concept to handover. The new showroom at the company headquarters in Billstedt, Germany offers samples for selecting appropriate interior design features for individual projects.

Dirk Hollweg from lux100 provided the professional lighting design services, with 50% of the interior design consisting of light. Hollweg’s lighting design also provides guidance for customers in the 250 m² showroom. The space is split into a variety of areas — reception, a waiting area, sales and meeting rooms, an area for sampling and selecting materials, a world of living and a bathroom exhibition.

The design is based on visual perception hierarchies: bright-dark contrasts or graduations in brightness establish a sense of drama, specifically emphasise individual areas in the space and enable these to visually come to the foreground. Less brightly illuminated areas are more discreet and blend into the background.

Individual areas are illuminated in a differentiated way to guide visitors specifically through the exhibition. The wall panel with a striking Otto Wulff logo at eye level, seen by visitors in the entrance area, is brightly and uniformly illuminated with a 24 W Optec wall-washer, transforming it into a central eye-catcher. A reception desk is situated on the right-hand side, above which two decorative Starpoint 8 W pendant luminaires with extra-wide floodlight distribution were installed. The wall area to the rear displays a ‘welcome’ greeting highlighted with a recessed Compact wall-washer. This area is significantly brighter than the opposite waiting area, giving visitors a clear signal to go towards the right. The lighting is unobtrusive in the waiting area to the left — an Optec spotlight illuminates a side table next to the sofa like a small island in the space; two Compact lens wall-washers illuminate the picture behind the sofa; and a decorative task light adds a cosy touch.

The tables in both meeting rooms are specifically highlighted with light where consultants present designs and planning details, as well as individual project information. In each case, only a single Skim recessed spotlight uniformly illuminates the tabletop without glare. A decorative task light, positioned at eye level on the shelf to the side, emphasises the high-quality appeal of the interior. The lighting design works with concise hierarchies of perception here as well: the focus with brightness and therefore attention is clearly on the tabletops, whilst other areas in the space blend more into the background.

Another area is dedicated to the display and selection of sample units and materials. The product display on the side wall in the centre of the showroom can be equipped with a selection of door hinges, window handles, light switches, tiles, wood samples and similar objects, which are lit using a 24 W Optec wall-washer that provides high lumen output from above and close to the products to ensure optimum presentation without shadowing or glare.

The rendering of colours and materials as true as possible to nature was a further essential factor in the lighting design. The ERCO LED lighting tools installed in 3000K warm white feature good outstanding colour rendering and achieve true-to-life material appearances (RA≥90).

The showroom demonstrates how innate brand values such as quality and the spirit of innovation can be communicated with the aid of light. The photometric advantages of ERCO lighting tools, eg, excellent colour rendering and consistent quality of light, also complement the diverse design options made available by high-precision ERCO lenses.

Image ©ERCO GmbH, www.erco.com. Photography: Sebastian Mayer, Berlin/Deutschland.