In a highly competitive manufacturing and creative setting that is conditioned on one hand by cost cutting battles and on the other by a rush towards technological innovation and advertising campaigns based on the designer star system, one certainly wouldn’t look to a troubled country like Lebanon in search of sophisticated and intelligent industrial products. One mentally turns to China for low-cost products, to Europe for an interesting creative contribution, Japan as a point of reference for technological expertise… And one settles on the notion that the rest of the world has, in terms of an industrial-creative profile, little to recount. So encountering a creative – and productive – team from Lebanon such as Pslab.Beirut comes as a great surprise. One’s curiosity is immediately aroused by this small multidisciplinary team and made up of architects, designers, engineers, technicians and marketers. Pslab, set up just three years ago, works in a well-defined field, concentrating on the development of lighting systems for use both indoors and outdoors.
The creative team’s resources and ideas are applied to specific contexts with the aim of creating fittings that can be as integrated as possible with their housing structures, thus minimising environmental impact. An example is the floating LED light fitting shown here, winner of the recent IF Product Design Award. It was designed for the square in the centre of Beirut known as Block 94, refurbished recently by architects Machado and Silvetti of Boston. The project site for the lighting design was articulated around an ancient Byzantine wall that stood behind a pool of water. This was immediately identified as a possible container for the light sources. The decision to insert semisubmerged elements in the pool meant that interesting reflections could be created and the wall is actually lit from below. The amount of light was carefully measured and designed to suit both day and night, thereby reducing light pollution. During the day, the polished, anti-corrosion stainless steel disc reflects sunlight, while at night LEDs inserted in the centre of the disc emit light that is reflected onto the water and the wall, creating an atmospheric setting.
The impact of this water lily of light is minimal; it does not invade or weigh on the environment. It is held in position by cables fixed to the bottom of the pool, also useful when carrying out maintenance of the fittings.
