ARCH364- BUILDING UTILITIES 3

TOPIC 1
INTRODUCTION AND HISTORY OF
ARCHITECTURAL LIGHTING
01 WHAT IS LIGHT
in physics?
Light is electromagnetic radiation that can be
detected by the human eye. Electromagnetic
radiation occurs over an extremely wide range of
wavelengths, from gamma rays with wavelengths
less than about 1 × 10−11 metres to radio waves
measured in metres.
Electromagnetic radiation is an electric and
magnetic disturbance traveling through space at
the speed of light.

It contains neither mass nor charge but travels in

packets of radiant energy called photons,or
quanta.
Electromagnetic radiation is produced whenever a
charged particle, such as an electron, changes its
velocity.
Ex. Whenever it accelerated or decelerated. The
energy of the electromagnetic radiations thus
produced comes from the charged particle and is
therefore lost by it.
Within that broad spectrum the wavelengths
visible to humans occupy a very narrow band,
from about 700 nanometres (nm; billionths of a
metre) for red light down to about 400 nm for
violet light. The spectral regions adjacent to the
visible band are often referred to as light also,
infrared at the one end and ultraviolet at the
other.
02 Speed of light?
The speed of light in a vacuum is a fundamental
physical constant, the currently accepted value of
which is exactly 299,792,458 metres per second,
or about 186,282 miles per second.

Speed of sound: 343 m/s

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03 What is light to
us, humans?
No single answer to the question “What is light?”
satisfies the many contexts in which light is
experienced, explored, and exploited..
The physicist: Interested in the physical properties
of light.

The artist: Aesthetic appreciation

of the visual world.

.
Everybody else: Primary tool for perceiving the
world and communicating within it..
 Why is light
04 important for the life
on earth?
Light is a primary tool for perceiving the world and
interacting with it for many organisms. Light from
the Sun warms the Earth, drives global weather
patterns, and initiates the life-sustaining process
of photosynthesis; about 1022 joules of solar
radiant energy reach Earth each day.

Light’s interactions with matter have also helped

shape the structure of the universe..
05 What is colour’s
relation to light?
In physics colour is associated specifically with
electromagnetic radiation of a certain range of
wavelengths visible to the human eye. The
radiation of such wavelengths constitutes that
portion of the electromagnetic spectrum known
as the visible spectrum—i.e., light..
 HISTORICAL
06 EVOLUTION OF
LIGHTING
The advent of reliable, energy efficient lighting in
the home and in our places of business has and
continues to play a major part in the modern way
of life. Along with running water’s impact on
general health, and perhaps the internet’s impact
on interpersonal communication, it’s hard to
imagine a more impactful technology than
lighting. As you might imagine, lighting has come a
long way to get to where it is today. :
 Old lamps

illustrated by: Maurice Dessertenne

 You could say
The design of the lamps
today is only limited to
MODERN LAMPS our imagination.
it’s important to think of three different things::

the fuel source

the luminaire,

and the technology used to produce visible light

Natural Light: The most important source of light is the
sun and perhaps the most underappreciated use of this
abundant light is architecture designed to take advantage
of Natural Lighting Photo in Pantheon it. One of the most
well known examples of historical architecture utilizing
daylight through its design is the Pantheon. Perhaps the
most significant architectural achievement from the
Roman Empire, the Pantheon is designed almost entirely
around the open air circle at the top of its dome.
PANTHEON
Torches: According to the Illuminating Engineering Society,
“the first attempt at man-made lighting occurred about 70,000
years ago. The first lamp was invented made of a Torch Photo
shell, hollowed-out rock, or other similar non-flammable
object which was filled with a combustible material (probably
dried grass or wood), sprinkled with animal fat (the original
lighter fluid) and ignited.”
Handheld and building mounted torches progressed well
beyond their rudimentary start but the basic principles remain
the same: the fuel source is some type of oil, wax, or
combustible material surrounded by non-flammable
material.
.
Candles & The Introduction Of The Wick: As you might expect,
technology like ventilation (e.g. tubes and chimneys) vastly
improved the ability to effectively use fire for lighting. Perhaps
the most important technology advancement, however, was
the introduction of the wick to produce candles.
Wicks in combination with early candle materials like beeswax
or tallow (a derivative of animal fat) then represented the most
significant technological lighting advancement since the
discovery of fire itself. According to author Patricia Telesco
“candle holders dating to the fourth century B.C. have been
found in Egypt.” She credits the Greeks and Romans with
introducing the wick to the Egyptian idea of wickless tallow
lighting. Asian societies were separately making candles out of
whale fat as early as 200 B.C.
A candle wick or lamp wick is usually made of braided cotton
that holds the flame of a candle or oil lamp. A candle wick
works by capillary action, conveying the fuel to the flame.

Tiny 1,500-year-old flax lamp wick

Candle wick
Did you know?
The word candle derives from the latin
word “incaendium” which means wildfire,
heat, or torch. The oldest surviving beeswax
candles are the Oberflacht candles that
were found in the Alamannic graveyard of
Seitingen-Oberflacht, Kreis Tuttlingen,
Germany. They presently reside at the
Württemberg State Museum in Stuttgart
Germany.
06
MAJOR
ADVANCEMENTS
The next major advancements in lighting
(gas lamps and electric lamps) happened
in sequence nearly a century apart with
the advent and progress of the industrial
revolution. Major advantages for gas
(barriers to entry for electricity) included
the already existing infrastructure by the
time electric lights came out and the
ability for dual purpose use (gas could
also be used for cooking).
Gas lamps: Gas lighting was developed in England in 1790 and
introduced to the United States shortly thereafter by William
Murdoch. Pelham Street in Newport, Rhode Island was the first
section of road in America to introduce Murdoch’s gas lights (they
were installed in 1792).

Only a few decades later gas fuel was being used for street lighting
in major eastern cities of the United States like Philadelphia and
Baltimore. Different types of gas have been used over the years to
include methane, acetylene, butane, propane, hydrogen, and
natural gas.
Gas lamps
NOT THIS!

Gaslighting is a colloquialism, loosely defined as manipulating

someone into questioning their own perception of reality.

Gaslighting happens when an abuser tries to control a victim by

twisting their sense of reality.
Electric lamps: The first electric light was created by Englishman
Humphry Davey.
According to the US Department of Energy Davy “demonstrated the
first incandescent light to the Royal Institute in Great Britain, using a
bank of batteries and two charcoal rods.” His invention was what
we commonly refer to as an arc light (modern day versions of which
are still being used today).
).

Arc Lamp
Perhaps the man most well known for the development of electric
light bulbs and the infrastructure to support them is American
inventor Thomas Edison. In 1879 Edison set out to invent a long-
lasting electric light bulb that could compete with gas lighting
(particularly for indoor use). His first successful prototype was on
October 22, 1879 when his incandescent light burned for 13 and a
half hours. A few months after that Edison discovered a carbonized
bamboo filament that would burn for 1200 hours. This was the
revolutionary advancement he was looking for and it represented
the necessary lighting technology required to establish electricity as
the primary power source for lighting both indoors and outsideod
A replica of Thomas Edison's
first incandescent light bulb,
made on his original
equipment in 1929 at the time
of the 50th Anniversary of its
invention.
Incandescent bulbs would go on to dominate the world of lighting
until fluorescent lights were introduced commercially by Daniel
McFarlan Moore circa 1904. Although early fluorescent lights
required high voltage and non-standard connectors to operate,
their relatively high efficiency when compared to incandescent
lights was significant enough competition to cause major
incandescent manufacturer General Electric to improve upon their
incandescent technology by introducing the tungsten filament.
Concurrently (circa 1901) an inventor named Peter Cooper Hewitt
had developed the first mercury-vapor light that was both high
efficiency and compatible with standard electrical infrastructure.
Fluorescent Tube Light
Tungsten Filament Lamp
Mercury Vapor
The 20th century was the century of high intensity discharge (HID)
lamps. Amongst the most popular and commercially successful
types of HID lamps are fluorescent, mercury-vapor, high
Modern lighting has continued to improve across the spectrum
(incandescent, fluorescent, metal halide, LED etc.). Thus far the
most promising lights for the 21st century appear to be LEDs.
Modern LEDs have a useful lifespan 2-4 times that of their average
competitor while producing high quality light much more efficiently
as well. For more information on LEDs you can read here.