Lighting on a grand scale
ÅF Lighting transforms Grand Hôtel’s Winter Garden.
The five-star Grand Hôtel in Stockholm is one of Scandinavia’s most renowned luxury hotels. Since it opened its doors in 1874, it has been host to many Nobel laureates, royalty and celebrities. Its spectacular festivity hall, the Winter Garden, is a high-ceilinged, glass topped space with balconies and pillars reminiscent of a grand Italian piazza, and is booked year round for various events.
To match the wide-ranging lighting needs of the modern day, ÅF Lighting was asked to design a versatile new lighting solution - naturally, while respecting the heritage of the historic building. The 19th century venue has now been stripped of its previous electrical fixtures and instead provided with a modern lighting solution where even the antique luminaires have been updated to LED.
ÅF Lighting has designed all the different types of lighting for the Winter Garden – the overall lighting, the highlighting of architectural features, and the stage and event lighting. The result is a versatile and efficient system with numerous luminaires, seamlessly integrated into the historic interior. Its many classical architectural details, such as arches, pillars and balustrades, have all been highlighted, without the use of visible fixtures.
The new lighting can be customized for any occasion. For instance, for a sophisticated relaxed atmosphere, the room can be lit with a warm white light, or in cooler shades for a sense of Swedish winter.
- We wanted to create something truly unique - a solution worthy of such an iconic building. With a generous budget and an open-minded client, we managed to push further than ever before, says project leader and chief lighting designer Oscar Nyström.
Video mapping is used to great effect in the Winter Garden. Together with interactive video technique specialists 3dsense, ÅF Lighting has developed eight scenarios that can be projected three dimensionally onto all the walls. Four architectural worlds - allowing visitors to experience a jungle, the Swedish archipelago, an Italian piazza or a winter wonderland - and four abstract scenarios, all with matching audio atmosphere.
Photos: Åke E-son Lindman
