Overview
The Winter Flower Show and Light Garden is Phipps Conservatory’s largest event of the year and draws over 120,000 visitors throughout its six week run. Phipps has recently installed a dynamic lighting installation in the Sunken Garden room and is seeking proposals for an interactive or reactive extension of the lighting system.
This project requires that groups design and build a fully-functioning prototype for the room and demo that prototype on site for the organization’s director. The director will select the most viable prototype to be further developed and temporarily installed in the Sunken Garden for the duration of the six week festival.
Details
Jordyn Melino, the Exhibit Coordinator and lead designer of the Light Garden, has provided us with two of the drawings they’ll be using to build the room. The first is the planting plan, which depicts all of the plants and locations for the room. Color is a major part of the show and the plants and decor will focus on reds and golds.
The second drawing depicts prop inspirations. The room’s theme will be one of a holiday feast, with props and plants that represent a holiday table setting.
Phipps Lighting Test from ULRStudio on Vimeo.
Goals
Because of the high visitor volume throughout the show, the Sunken Garden is prone to long lines. The goal of this project is two-fold:
- Enhance and augment the whimsical decorations of the room.
- Entertain visitors as they queue up to pass through the next room.
Requirements
- Groups of 4 or 5 will design and develop a functioning prototype to present on October 15th.
- Projects interact with the lights using our class’s custom API
- No screen-based projects
- At least one sensor input (this can be a microphone, a board of potentiometers, buttons, etc)
Selection Rubric
- Robustness: will a final version of this project be able to stand up to 120,000 people in six weeks?
- Integration: how well does this project mesh with the existing decor of the room (color, whimsy, fun, etc)
- Timing: is this something that won’t hinder the already slow-moving lines? Can visitors enjoy this without it clogging up the space?
Timeline
- Thursday, September 28: Class tour of Phipps, Q&A with Jordyn Melino
- Tuesday, October 3: Design proposal blog post due, review in class
- Tuesday, October 3: Introduce lighting API and simulator
- Thursday, October 5 – 12: In-class development
- Thursday, October 12: In-class demo with lighting simulation – prototype must be functional!
- Sunday, October 15: Evening demos at Phipps