Most sane people would agree that those responsible for the redevelopment of Coventry in the decades after the destruction of World War II should have been tried for crimes against humanity. However, an attempt to make amends has now been made with the Coventry Phoenix Initiative, an ambitious plan by the City Council to regenerate the area around the Cathedral and the periphery of the city centre.
The masterplans, from architects MacCormac Jamieson Prichard and lighting designers Speirs and Major Associates, includes a commitment to integrating the refurbished historic and new urban spaces. A process which has spanned nearly seven years is explained here in detail by Philip Rose of Speirs and Major Associates who was integral to the scheme...

After many years working with the City of Coventry, Speirs and Major Associates has recently implemented a number of lighting projects identified in the Lighting Strategy for Coventry City Centre which was completed in 1998. The relationship with the city of Coventry began in 1997 when the City Council approached Speirs and Major Associates through a competitive process to develop a lighting strategy for the city centre. The council's ambition was to create a city of light to rival Lyon in France. Whilst completing the lighting strategy, a special demonstration took place in the heart of the city at the end of October 1997. Entitled 'City Lights' it set out to demonstrate various lighting techniques including the use of large scale colour change and image projection to enhance the city centre.

This demonstration illustrated the opportunities offered through dynamic lighting to create spectacle and drama. Such techniques are an integral part of the first phase of the implementation of projects identified in the lighting strategy.

After the success of 'City Lights' the council asked Speirs and Major Associates to develop a new approach to the city's Christmas lighting. As a response to this, a design for a decorative light canopy over the precinct cross was developed. White rope light is suspended over the fountain to create the canopy. The development and implementation of the Christmas lights marked a change in Coventry's approach to the celebration of light within the city during the hours of darkness.

The lighting strategy adopted by Coventry City Council set out guidelines for the architectural lighting of buildings, structures, and spaces. It also identifies a number of key projects including the Council House, Coventry's three famous spires of Christchurch Spire, Holy Trinity Church and old Cathedral, three post war tower blocks (Coventry Point, Hillman House and Mercia House) and Spon Street.

On completion of the lighting strategy, we were commissioned to light the Council House. It was seen as a catalyst to assist the City's development directorate in persuading the public and private sector to undertake similar projects of their own.

The historic Council House, located in the city centre, is illuminated to highlight the architecture of this listed building. Our philosophy was not to use traditional floodlighting techniques, but rather to softly draw out the architectural features using a combination of close offset and remote source lighting techniques. This created a unified composition that works both from distant and close proximities.

The facade of the building is illuminated by a combination of warm white light sources emphasising the bay windows. Uplights highlight the underside of the bays and at first floor level, the windows are lit from the sills. At the second floor concealed low voltage spotlights highlight the window reveals and mounted to the flagpoles are additional low voltage spotlights for the occasional lighting of flags.

The intensity of the lighting is increased to the central bay to emphasise the main entrance. Four special lighting columns with hanging glass lanterns were developed; these are based on original lanterns mounted over a number of side entrances. The columns also provide mounting positions for a variety of low voltage spotlights that illuminate the statues, architectural ornament, and heraldry of the central bay.

The slate roof including the clock tower is illuminated using a combination of cool white sources with internal illumination to the turrets and floodlighting to the chimneys. The weather vanes on each of the towers and the 'Peeping Tom' statue located underneath the clock are spotlit with refurbished lighting to the clock face.

Following completion of the lighting strategy, Coventry decided to rapidly implement a number of major lighting projects that came out of the report. In September 1998 Coventry City Council invited a number of leading lighting designers to compete in a competition for the three Spires, three Towers and Spon Street projects. The '3 Spires' and '3 Towers' projects originated from a project called '2 x 3 Towers' that identified feature lighting to the three historic spires of Coventry in juxtaposition to the three post war tower blocks.

The competition brief called for not only an architectural lighting solution, but also a layer of spectacle lighting to each project. Despite stiff competition, after submission, presentation and interview Speirs and Major Associates won the commission to carry out the lighting design for all three projects.

The '3 Spires' project consists of Christchurch Spire, Holy Trinity Church, the Old and New Cathedrals. Our philosophy, as with the Council House was not to traditionally floodlight the churches, but to illuminate the architectural features creating an overall image for each church. Each spire is washed in white light, with the base of the spire illuminated by floodlights concealed behind the parapet, creating a 'solid' lit element with a connection to each tower. This unifies the spires creating an overall image for the project especially when seen from afar.

Christchurch Spire, the first phase of the project is illuminated using a combination of the cool and warm light white sources. At the base of the building, cool white uplighting to the elevations ground the tower with low voltage uplights accenting the entrance arches. Warm white linear sources uplight the window reveals of the tower providing a visual connection between the spire and base. Internally mounted floodlights to the tower create a warm glow that is seen through the windows.

The second phase of the project was Holy Trinity Church. The lower body of the church has warm white uplights to the buttresses of each gable, framing the elevations and providing a soft background to these areas of the facade. The west facade of the church has low voltage uplights to the entrance with concealed projectors at balcony level framing the window above. The stained glass is backlit providing a soft glow to the window when seen externally. Major trees in the churchyard are illuminated with cool white uplights providing a visual base to the lighting scheme. Each window reveal of the clerestory is bathed in warm white giving the upper tier of the church a presence. Finials are backlit with low voltage spotlights providing a soft glow to their architectural form. The body of the tower is floodlit with warm white light creating a 'solid' to connect it to the main body of the church and spire. The spire interior is floodlit creating a soft warm internal glow. The lighting of the Old and New Cathedrals was developed to provide each with its own distinctive character, but maintains a cohesive unity. Light unifies the two cathedrals with a visible connection of the New Cathedral's entrance canopy overhanging the Old Cathedral.

The new Cathedral's window tracery to the east facade and font window is uplit with projectors mounted in custom gimbal arrangements and recessed in pits along the fa�ade. The west fa�ade is lit using a similar technique but the projectors are column mounted due to on site restrictions. The cross to the north fa�ade is highlighted with warm white light. The two chapels are internally illuminated allowing them to glow from within. The Chapel of Unity has its stained glass windows internally uplit and the Guild Chapel's gold ceiling is uplit to provide a warm soft glow. The pylon like spire is internally illuminated using warm white light and the statue of St Michael mounted on top is spot lit. The Cathedral steps are washed with warm white light, with the statue of St Michael and Devil are highlighted with low voltage spotlights. The canopy of the new Cathedral is uplit with cool white light from the parapet of the adjacent old Cathedral reflecting light down into the entrance putting the suspended crosses of the entrance area into silhouette when seen from the Cathedral steps and St Michael Avenue.

The old Cathedral tower is washed in cool white light and its buttresses uplit to visually ground the tower. Low voltage uplights accent the entrances to the old Cathedral. The interior of the old Cathedral has its walls softly washed with warm white light by asymmetric uplights to accent the tracery of the windows. Mounted at parapet level, low voltage spotlights highlight the statues and Cross of Nails over and around the altar. The remaining statues are lit either with low voltage spotlights mounted on the parapet or using asymmetric uplights. Low voltage uplights to the columns stubs running down the centre of the nave create a dramatic lighting effect. Warm white uplighting to the exterior of the apse provides reflected light to the disabled ramp leading up to the Cathedral's entrance.

The Cathedral environs include the Cathedral's precinct, the surrounding cobbled streets, and Coventry Cross. Custom street lighting columns were developed based on existing historic columns found adjacent to Holy Trinity Church. The mature trees located along the perimeter of the Cathedral precinct are uplit with warm white lights and custom designed luminaires mounted at low-level to light St Michaels Avenue leading to the Cathedral's entrance.

A replica of the medieval Coventry Cross is illuminated with warm white light uplighting to the base and column mounted spotlights washing the body of the cross.

We are currently completing the spectacle lighting for the project, and after careful consideration of what spectacle lighting was appropriate for churches, a concept was developed to project images and colour onto each spire. Each spire has been given a theme related to it's relationship to the city, these themes echo back to the images projected during the 1997 'City Lights' festival. The themes are 'Communication and Regeneration', 'Industry and Religion' and 'Conflict and Reconciliation'.

A combination of two colours (with 400W We-ef narrow beam projectors) and custom designed images (Derksen 1200W image projectors) are projected on the spires of Christchurch and Holy Trinity with only images simultaneously projected onto the west fa�ade of the old Cathedral's tower and spire. The '3 Towers' project consist of three post war tower blocks in the city centre, Coventry Point, Hillman House and Mercia House. Due to the restricted budget, the solution provides a dynamic lighting scheme. As the two of the tower blocks are residential, traditional floodlighting was not an option. The design developed into a permanent dynamic architectural solution where the crowns of the buildings are lit with Space Cannon 1200W colour change units, and with Louis Poulsen LED beacons along the crowns and facades of each of the tower block.

The concept was to provide the city with a weather predictor for the following day through a dynamic lighting solution. The colour of the crowns indicates the next day's weather and kinetic LED beacons indicate temperature change, wind speed and direction and air quality.

On Coventry Point and Mercia House, colour change projectors wash the crowns and on Hillman House, a continuous band of colour changing cold cathode was developed by ACDC Lighting to link the crown to the other two tower blocks. Around the perimeter of each crown custom individually addressable surface mounted colour change LED beacons are located. The lighting to each building is linked using radio DMX signals.

Each of the facades of the three tower blocks has custom individually addressable surface mounted single colour LED beacons mounted vertically on the facades.

Periodically the towers perform a short light show unconnected with the weather; creating a lighting spectacle, with the LEDs chasing up and down the facades the buildings and the colour changes to the crowns.

Spon Street located west of the city centre consists of a number of relocated and rebuilt historic buildings that survived the bombings of the 2nd World War. The buildings themselves are a combination of timber-framed buildings and Georgian houses. The majority of buildings are used as shops, restaurants, cafes and public houses and St John Baptist Church at the entrance to the Street.

The concept was developed to provide a number of different lighting requirements including the relighting of the street in keeping with the scale of the buildings, lighting the architectural features of the historic building and signage lighting to a number of businesses.

Custom 5 metre high lighting columns were developed to safely illuminate the street utilising a warm white light source and full horizontal cut off. The columns have a decorative ring bracket located below the lantern. Mounted on the ring bracket on a number of columns are warm white ceramic metal halide spotlights that cross light the upper storeys of the timber-framed buildings. At a number of strategic locations along the street, including at the entrance, the lantern has a gas flambeau component to its top. At ground level, uplights illuminate the overhangs of the timber-framed buildings.

With a restricted budget St John the Baptist Methodist Church is lit to provide a gateway to Spon Street. As with the churches in the 3 Spires project, this church is illuminated by highlighting architectural elements to create an overall image. The east and west gable ends are washed using warm white uplights. The entrance doors are accented with low voltage uplights. The clerestory and tower are washed with warm white light with highlights to the clock faces.

In June 1999, Speirs and Major Associates were appointed as the lighting designer for the Phoenix Initiative, a large scale regeneration project in the city centre, masterplanned by architects MacCormac Jamieson Prichard. The Phoenix Initiative created a number of new public spaces linking the historic Cathedral area of the city to a new public garden adjacent to the ring road to the north. The brief was to provide a cohesive overall lighting design strategy that responds to the nature of different public spaces being created, both small intimate gardens and large open public spaces.

The lighting had to respond to large architectural interventions and provide a backdrop to an ambitious public art programme. After dark, its character transforms as the artwork and architectural features are dramatically lit creating focal points, in contrast to a base layer of subtle warm white amenity lighting maintaining the human scale defines safe pedestrian routes throughout the scheme.

Starting in the historic Cathedral quarter of the city, the Phoenix Initiative commences with Priory Garden, Priory Visitor Centre, and Priory Cloister leading to Priory Place and Millennium Place. The Garden of International Friendship is linked to Millennium Place by a glass spiral ramp and bridge that takes you over the existing Lady Herberts Garden.

In Priory Garden, integrated balustrade lighting washes the deck of the bridge that overlooks the garden. Low-level bollards define the paths around the garden. Excavated, archeological features of the old priory are encased in glass display cabinets and glow at night.

The Priory Visitor Centre provides a flexible exhibition space at ground floor level with a meeting room at first floor level for the community to use. It is simply lit to highlight its architectural and archeological features. In Priory Cloister, artist David Ward's light and sound installation provides the lighting. Around the perimeter of the cloister, blue linear cold cathode uplights the boundary wall, in contrast to cool white uplighting to the trees.

Priory Place is floodlit with warm white light from first floor level and low voltage spotlights mounted to the bracket uplight the building facades. Susanna Heron's waterfall cascades over copper clad wall that has been subtly illuminated to highlight the movement of water.

In Millennium Place, the perimeter of the plaza is defined by the lighting of footpaths and uplighting to the People's Bench, allowing lower lighting levels and Fran�oise Schein's Time Zone Clock to become the focal point. The Whittle Arches are softly washed with blue light and internally lit with amber LEDs to help reinforce their transparency when seen at night.

The glass spiral ramp and bridge is lit from below using custom linear fluorescent, providing illumination through the bridge deck, and lights the glass artwork of Alexander Beleschenko linking Millennium Place with the Garden of International Friendship.

The bridge enters the garden via a viewing platform on a grassed landscape mound and a large contemporary stone arch dominates the garden. This has been uplit with low voltage sources to accentuate its architectural form. Paths in the garden are defined with warm white light and cool white uplighting to trees creates visual interest.

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