Lighting in Design August-September 2015

Ancient bronzes and marble sculptures in avant-garde ambience

E RCO lighting tools feature in one of the most dramatic museum projects this year. The lighting supplied by the company for the ex- hibition and outdoor areas of the new Fondazione Prada in Milan demonstrates how sophisticated lighting solutions are implemented efficiently in visionary museums. The expansive complex, designed by Dutch star architect and Pritzker Architecture Prize win- ner Rem Koolhaas (OMA, Rotterdam), arose from the transformation of a distillery dating back to around 1910, in the south of Milan. The exteriors and the exhibition spaces of the Fondazione Prada are equipped with a range of Erco LED lighting tools. These were selected by the cultural founda- tion, spearheaded by Miuccia Prada and Patrizio Bertelli with consistent support from Erco, as a result of many years of experience in museum lighting. The lighting tools offer an ideal solution for the varied and com- plex lighting tasks required in a museum context – with a not untypical combination of uniform, glare-free ambient lighting and exact accent lighting for prized exhibits. In the ‘Podium’ that forms the central museum section of the Fondazione Prada with glass façades on three sides, Parscan spotlights,