• 101 Collins street (Melbourne) •

Lighting designer: Barry Webb & Associates
Lighting supplier: Lightmoves Pty Lt
Equipment: 4 CityColors

101 COLLINS ST Melbourne Landmark Lit in Style

Barry Webb & Associates, who specialise in lighting consultancy and electrical engineering, were recently commissioned by 101 Collins Street, Melbourne to relight the mast on top of their building.
The interesting factor about the job is that architectural lighting products were mixed with theatrical techniques to achieve a look that would normally only be seen in a theatrical environment.
Due to the environment, all products had to have a long life lamp. Several products considered had to be abandoned because they did not have a suitable lamp life, even some fittings with a high IP rating.
Over a period of time, many trials were undertaken and, eventually, a final image consisting of three elements was chosen: mast floodlighting, neon outline and neon spire features. The two existing floodlighting systems were incapable of illuminating the entire mast structure and so the two 30 metre spires were not visible at night. It was decided to place four Studio Due CityColor floodlights, supplied by Lightmoves Pty Ltd, at the bottom of the mast to light its lower section. Cost of lamps was a major consideration and the CityColor uses a long life standard architectural lamp available from multiple suppliers.
"The CityColors were new to the market, a floodlight that offered full colour mixing was ideal," said Roger Farley, Project Engineer for Barry Webb. "They were appropriate for the base of the mast and they were priced competitively. They've performed well." Also at the bottom are four Siemens 2kW Sports Compact floodlights which are mounted behind Showcraft Architectural colour changers. Each colour changers houses six motorised trays, five of which contain coloured glass and one of which is a blackout.

On the top deck, lighting the inside of the two spires, are four WE-EF 250W FL10 floodlights with scaled-down versions of the Showcraft colourchangers mounted on the front of them.
To complete the composition and define the top of the mast, a glow of blue light is provided at the top of each of the mast spires. Neon technology from TS&L Neon in Melbourne is used for this, where a specially designed structure has been developed to encase the neon and allow for ease of installation.
Phase three of the project is yet to be completed - to provide a sense of continuity and attachment of the mast to the building, the plantroom structure immediately below the mast will be outlined with a continuous neon strip running along the top edge of the plantroom and down each corner of the structure. This lighting will help create the vision of a pedestal on which the floodlit mast structure will sit.
The control system had to have all the usual levels of control that is required for an Architectural control system, such as Photo Electric Cells to switch on and off with the outside light levels. It also had to be integrated with the existing building management system. Additionally it had to control DMX 512 controlled light fixtures, and had to be able to be programmed and updated remotely.

"For example, the initial programming sessions were done in a building 4 city blocks from 101 Collins St" said Braham Ciddor of Lightmoves Pty Ltd. "For the Midsumma Gay & Lesbian Festival the building owners requested that the colour be changed to pink. The new colour was programmed from the Lightmoves offices in Hawthorn. The Dynalite system that was installed was the most cost effective of the limited number of commercially available systems that could do all that was required. The advantage of this system is that as the later stages go ahead additional products can be added in with a building block approach."
Some initial monitoring of the system during the early stages including checking switch-on times and sequence programming was done via a webcam that is actually mounted on the tower of 101 Collins.

"At http://webcam.omni.net.au, at the extremities of the camera's movement, we are able to see if the lights are on and what colour they are in," explained Braham Ciddor. The electrical contractors for the project were Brolec.