Featured

Daylighting

Our daylighting design services range from general consulting on window performance and integration with electric lighting systems to computer-simulated analyses of specific daylight conditions, such as site overshadowing, annual overheating periods and worst-case-scenario sun exposure. We also develop specifications for shading devices and perform visualizations to anticipate qualitatively how daylight will impact the architecture at any given time of day. Through these analyses, our daylighting work addresses quantitative project objectives to meet energy code or light level requirements as well as overall intent for the architecture’s day-night composition.

Residence

The range of residential projects in our portfolio demonstrates our flexible, varied approach to residential lighting. Since we work on so many different housing types, from college dormitories and multi-unit affordable housing developments to high-end single family homes, we base our lighting design approach on the particular qualities of each project rather than apply a standard design to all of them.

Education

Our experience in many project types, such as landscape, workplace, hospitality and budget-focused projects, informs our educational portfolio. This includes not just schools and university buildings, but other projects that demonstrate our commitment to a broad interpretation of education. Interactive museum exhibits, educational light art and research-focused community engagement projects all encourage various forms of learning and promote interdisciplinary collaboration.

Budget

Our experience working on projects with strict budget limitations has led us to streamline our budget management process. To ensure that projects satisfy cost limitations without compromising design quality, we present anticipated lighting hardware costs alongside design proposals in every project phase, and develop product specifications that support competitive bidding and leverage economies of scale. We also take into account the long-term costs of lighting equipment operation and maintenance, with the understanding that budget-conscious lighting design must remain economical over time.

Workplace

The projects in our workplace portfolio give us opportunities to use light to foster collaboration and enhance company identity. Our familiarity with energy standards such ASHRAE, LEED and WELL bolsters our work on these projects, which often involve ambitious sustainability targets.

Hospitality

Our portfolio includes a range of hotels, inns, restaurants, bars, cafés and food halls. With a particular focus on enhancing the individual character of each of these spaces, our approach to hospitality projects draws on light’s capacity to foster conviviality and connection.

Light Art

Given the interdisciplinary nature of our design process, we are hesitant to distinguish too sharply between light art and lighting design. The way we approach each informs the other, and those approaches are always evolving. Our portfolio of work that specifically explores spatial and perceptual qualities of light as the primary subject includes gallery exhibitions, permanent sculptural installations, community engagement events and photographic studies.

Research

Our firm’s close connection to academia often leads us to consider our lighting design work in the context of our broader research interests. This research manifests in our design practice in various ways, from lectures and publications to advanced technical analyses. Our commitment to sharing our research interests with both the design community and the public at large leads us to participate in community engagement workshops to better understand how lighting affects people, and to seek out work that gives us the opportunity to rethink typical design processes.

Night Identity

Many of our more prominent urban projects involve establishing an intentional nighttime presence for the architecture in its context—what we refer to as the building’s night identity. Both interior and exterior lighting contribute to this effort. Interior lighting that is visible through windows or glass walls can suggest liveliness, a sense that activity is happening within the building, while exterior lighting can highlight facade features or illuminate adjacent sidewalks. Our night identity experience includes historic buildings (which often have strict exterior lighting requirements) as well as contemporary projects.

Landscape

We are committed to designing lighting for exterior spaces that encourages recreation and social interaction while remaining considerate to plant and animal habitats. Our landscape lighting portfolio includes parks and gardens as well as university campuses and urban streetscapes. Our design approach for these projects is determined by the spatial characteristics of each site and how it relates to its surroundings. In selecting exterior lighting equipment, we balance durability considerations with aesthetics, keeping in mind how it will appear in the landscape during the day.

Historic

The historic projects in our portfolio include many well-known structures whose architecture is central to the atmosphere of their surrounding cities and towns. These projects demonstrate our experience tackling the specific issues that arise when illuminating historic architecture with modern lighting equipment. We prioritize the detailing of all our lighting solutions to ensure that they will integrate with the historic fabric. Our consideration of the historic lighting intent of each space often leads to restoration and retrofitting of existing decorative light fixtures.

Focusing

Focusing a lighting system after installation involves aiming adjustable fixtures and adjusting effects using optical and glare control accessories to fine-tune lighting performance. A critical part of our process is to review the focusing goals with other team members, such as architects or exhibition designers, and refine the composition of light and shadow to ensure that the lighting supports the design or curatorial intent. Much of the focusing we do is for art exhibitions, for which our process also includes devising fixture layouts for flexible lighting systems and meeting conservation light level requirements where applicable.

Culture

Our firm is committed to supporting cultural organizations, particularly those that promote the arts and sciences. Our portfolio includes a wide range of these institutions, such as libraries, train stations, government buildings, theaters, aquariums, museums, galleries and other exhibit spaces. These projects provide us with valuable opportunities to support local communities through lighting design.

In Progress

A selection of projects that are in currently progress.

Featured

A selection of portfolio highlights spanning Flux Studio expertise.

Controls

Lighting controls—the coordination of light fixture dimming levels to support varying uses in a particular space—are an important factor in the success of our designs. Our process for developing lighting control strategies includes working with building owners and occupants to understand how they expect to use the space, then translating this information to lighting control system settings. We also manage lighting controls coordination across project teams, and ensure that building users are comfortable with operating the lighting control system after it is installed.

Royal Norwegian Embassy

July 05, 2024 in Controls, Culture, Budget, Featured

Washington, DC | 2021

The renovation of the Royal Norwegian Embassy celebrates Norwegian culture with architectural features inspired by the country’s landscape and traditions. Our scope included lighting design for the lobby, open stair, garden room, and offices, as well as landscape lighting. In the main lobby, we concentrated our design approach on reconciling security lighting requirements with the low light levels desired for a hospitality-centered program. To satisfy these conflicting requirements, we devised a layout of recessed linear lights arranged in adjoining rectangles to make the space feel cohesive while allowing for individual control of lighting in different areas. Perimeter lighting in the exterior spaces accentuates the relationship between interior and exterior, while straightforward office lighting design ensured that the project adhered to budget constraints. Our work on this project also included developing a control system and establishing the building’s night identity.

Collaborators | Fentress Architects, Alan Karchmer/OTTO (Photographer)

Links | Project @ Fentress Architects

Recognition

2023 LIT Award for LED Interior Lighting Design, LIT Lighting Design Awards
2023 Illumination Award for Interior Lighting, IES DC
2023 Design Award of Merit, AIA Colorado
2023 International Architecture Award - Restoration/Renovation, The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design
2022 Grand Award, AIA DC
2022 Best of the Year Awards Finalist - Government Institutional, Interior Design Magazine
Norway’s revamped D.C. embassy opens | The Architect's Newspaper
Fentress Architects overhauls Norwegian Embassy in Washington DC | dezeen