We talk a lot about designing for the senses these days; about human engineering, ergonomics, people-centric products. It’s particularly a hot topic when it comes to looking at the modern working environment. If today’s office is to compete with home, it needs to bring similar feelings of comfort, but promote productivity and collaboration at the same time. Designers and architects are responding with increased attention towards auditory comfort, finely-tuned lighting, and cosseting touches via texture, color and shape.
An Architectural Product to Serve All the Senses
What if all these space-shaping elements could be combined into one super product that handled acoustics, both ambient and task lighting, and brought textural intimacy to a lofty-ceilinged echo-prone work zone? It’s the task Intra lighting set themselves when they conceived Pyrymyd. The family-run Slovenian company founded—and still run—by Marino Furlan, has built a global reputation for the design and manufacture of architectural lights and lighting solutions, which have illuminated the offices of Microsoft, Facebook and Ferrari. Now it is using its expertise to combine highly technical ambient lighting with earth-friendly acoustic paneling, which also serves as a ceiling.
Pyrymyd was designed by Serge and Robert Cornelissen. The Belgian studio was responsible for conceiving a decorative, textural product—panels whose graphic relief is sure to help humanize a voluminous office space, while simultaneously taming sound and accommodating a light source. Building in all essential technical functionalities, however, was left to the Intra lighting development team. "We had two major challenges. First was finding the correct acoustic material. We wanted a material that is acoustically effective and that is moldable and flame resistant," says the R&D Engineer Rok Kompara. This, it turns out, was a surprisingly time-consuming task, but they found their answer eventually in a material that is made from 60% recycled materials and is itself 100% recyclable. "Secondly, we had to find a manufacturer with the necessary know-how to produce the shape, which is quite complex geometry and requires precision in terms of process."
Advanced Optics for Sensitive Illumination
That achieved, the team sought to incorporate the ultimate in lighting technology, to ensure that this aspect—the aspect the Intra-lighting team are best known for—was as advanced as possible. There are in fact two lighting systems offered as part of Pyrymyd; one is called Deco, and as the name suggests, uses light decoratively, creating a graphic pattern as it diffuses through the 3D moldings.
The second is the highly innovative Bartenbach LFO optic. This option intriguingly hides the LED source, providing universal, glare-free illumination. Look from the side and it is impossible to identify where the light emerges from. "It’s very controlled and very uniform," says Nenad Jovović, Product Manager. "There is a kind of mixing chamber where the rays merge and are angled through a narrow bottleneck. From the side you can’t see which of the pyramids have the light source. The panels appear dark. It gives you the freedom—where you need more light you can put more of these panels, and where you don’t need so much you can put panels without light sources. They look the same."
A Customizable Ceiling With Integrated Light and Sound Absorption
Add in the possibility of a light sensor concealed within a pyramid, which can trigger the lights to come on when daylight drops, and Pyrymyd becomes a highly engineered product, responding precisely to human needs. It is also highly customizable—the panels clip into a ceiling or can be clipped together as a suspended structure—and can be adjusted or changed in arrangement if the focus for lighting (such as a meeting table) shifts beneath.
The next evolution will be a broadening of the color palette. Currently available in shades of grey, more chromatic choice will offer more ways to elevate the sensorial effect; one more dimension to this latest multi-functioning innovation for interiors.
