The idea of the City lounge was to create an activated public space to unite all the buildings in this area. The quarter consists of several residential, administration and bank buildings, shops, bars and restaurants. As in a child’s game, the idea of the swiss artist Pipilotti Rist was to lift up all structural elements in the quarter, such as buildings, trees or street signs, and lay a red carpet underneath. At the same time soft shapes placed beneath this carpet should invite people to sit or lay down and play. The public space should become a living space for everybody. The lighting design consequently follows the living space idea, creating a very soft lighting, flooding the space diffusely at night.
The luminaires themselves come with a very organic shape, inspired by smoke filled soap-bubbles hovering in the sky. They change their colour in a pastel range of light, slowly and almost not perceivable. The form itself was developed together with architect Carlos Martinez. The bubbles consist of a pearl like sphere cover with nano-technology finish which has a lotus effect to let the rain and snow slip down easily. An inside mounting plate contains lamps, ballasts and controls. An additional system controls humidity and temperature to switch on the heating if necessary and thus melt the snow on top. In the evening the white and colourful fluorescent lighting is switched on, creating a warm lounge illumination. Light controls allow a soft transition of colour and intensity of the light, like breathing bubbles floating in the air. Later in the night it shifts softly to the metal halide lamps with narrow beam angles. For long maintenance cycles each luminaire is equipped with two 250W metal halide lamps and automatically switches to the other, whenever one of the lamps breaks down.
