Penhaligons
Knightsbridge

Client
Penhaligons Limited London now Cradle Holdings (Penhaligons) INC

 

Contractors
A. Davies & Co. (Shopfitters) LTD., Direct Electrical, Southend

 

Lighting Design
Future Group Lighting Design 020 8925 0009
Bespoke ELV continuous lighting designed by Future Group Lighting Design and manufactured by Light Projects

 

Architect
AMS John Architects London

Penhaligons, the long established perfumery opened a new shop in Beauchamp Place Knightsbridge in 1998, which included three facial treatment rooms. The perfume bottles and general feel of the shop suggested the use of Tungsten Halogen Lighting. The ability to rely on a neat precisely aimed lighting array, always working, was paramount.

Brief
To create an easy to maintain installation, accurate in its direction of light but minimalist in its appearance in the retail setting.

 

Challenges
The shop was a very old building with timber beams and plaster ceilings. The upstairs was not a part of the retail space, making access to the voids above the ceiling difficult after installation. The partially mirrored walls meant that a special bespoke continuous array of lights was needed without hundreds of transformers and untidy aiming. Seventeen Voltmasters were placed in a ventilated plant room downstairs, making a clean installation with no serviceable parts in the ceiling except for the lamps themselves. Avoiding a cluttered ceiling, the lighting designer was able to position all of the spotlights at a convenient fixed distance apart from one other and semi-recess the detail.

 

Result
The whole project has needed so little maintenance that the client has been delighted with the installation. The appearance is warm and friendly but the lighting has a constant quality with the GE Precise lamps burning at their true white colour temperature.

"The colour of the lighting is really crisp...140 lamps were run on Voltmasters for 12 hours per day 6 days a week. After 18 months only 15 had blown. By comparison, there were four existing 12V spotlights run on mains track with integral standard transformers not part of the refubishment, all four blew regularly every two months." Peter Phillipson, Lighting Designer.

 

The shop has since been altered to suit Penhaligon's sister brand "L'Artisan", but the lighting was not altered at all, so strong were the features of the design.

“The colour of the lighting is really crisp...140 lamps were run on Voltmasters for 12 hours per day 6 days a week. After 18 months only 15 had blown. By comparison, there were four existing 12V spotlights run on mains track with integral standard transformers not part of the refubishment, all four blew regularly every two months.”

Peter Phillipson
Lighting Designer