Third Age of Light VR Experience

What is public lighting for? How will we experience the urban realm after dark? As designers working with light we challenged ourselves to consider these questions and to speculate on how London may be illuminated in the near future.
 
Date
2020

London in the near future: a city in which the experience of the night is focused and autonomous, yet variable and shared. A world immersed in media and light, but where darkness once again has a tangible role. This is the ‘Third Age of Light’. 

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This VR exhibition was a collation of some of our ideas and insights into how new attitudes and potential developments might alter the way we experience London after dark.”

Will micro-robotics and crowd-sensing technology give rise to mobile lighting in cities?

Advancements in technologies could see large-scale public lighting delivered by groups of small autonomous aerial devices. Will we see street lighting replaced by clouds of light-giving micro-bots that respond to the activities of people?

Will increased automation completely alter our skylines, leaving our buildings much darker at night?

The lights that blaze in our glazed office tower blocks and active building sites are a clear expression of the 24/7 global economy, As developments in Artificial Intelligence and robotics have an impact on our work patterns, will the London skyline of the future be left mostly in the dark?