TOPIC

Lighting

Eclipsed on the Concourse

The removal of a public art installation by Maya Lin to make way for a better, brighter Penn Station portends a growing denial of the precarity of human passage through time and space.

People Movers

Building Consensus

Buildings are responsible for two thirds of greenhouse gas emissions in New York City. Can tenants, landlords, and environmentalists finally get together to make them more efficient?

Bright Megaphone

With simple phrases beamed in light, the Illuminator Collective appropriates buildings' exteriors to reveal the forces at work inside.

Beyond Resilience

Nearly six years after Sandy flooded basements and uprooted trees, Red Hook Houses is still in recovery. But designers from KPF and OLIN see a future brighter than survival, when infrastructure combines with art and the landscape rises above the waterline.

Illuminated Futures

The city that never sleeps depends on 396,572 street lights. As bright white LEDs replace the familiar amber glow, what does tomorrow (night) hold?

Multitasking Infrastructures: A Conversation with Sheila Kennedy and Veit Kugel

Sheila Kennedy and Veit Kugel discuss integrating natural systems, material innovation, and digital technology in projects that reflect a singular and synergistic approach to architecture, infrastructure, and civic space.

Portfolio: Out My Window

We are all to an extent on display to each other, but we pretend not to notice, and do not to attempt to bridge the narrow spatial but chasm-like psychological gaps between buildings.

Project Neon

Kirsten Hively describes her effort to seek out, document and encourage appreciation of the best neon in New York and shares her photography of the city's glow.

Portfolio: The Night Shadow

Michael Neff outlines the contours of city shadows with chalk and then photographs the resulting drawings, documenting those temporary moments, both showcasing and preserving the play of light and shadow in the urban environment.

Studio Reports

Parsons Integrated Studio: 79th St. Boat Basin

David Leven and Derek Porter discuss how their architecture and lighting design students collaborated to reimagine access to and use of this complex waterfront site.