The “Jewel in the Strand”, the church is a Grade I listed landmark building. The Strand is the famous street in the centre of London.
A refurbishment of the whole church will be starting soon. The exterior lighting was pushed forward first to put the building on the map and to link with the pedestrianisation of the Strand which has just been completed.
There was an existing exterior lighting scheme that had fallen into disrepair, only a few of the luminaires were still working. All the luminaires were old, less efficient metal halide technology.
Sutton Vane Associates decided to get the existing fittings repaired, refurbished and converted to LED. This was much more ecological and greener than purchasing new fittings. The fittings were refurbished in the UK which also cut down travel miles which added even more to the ecological benefit. Refurbishing was also much cheaper than buying new luminaires. This meant that the total project cost was a lot less than budgeted which pleased the client hugely.
The luminaires all make 3,000K white light and save energy as the 4,500 lumen output of each luminaire is created using less electricity than the original 150 watt metal halide lamps. A lot of the light output of the metal halide lamps was wasted. More of the output of the LED light engines is used which is an additional factor in increasing the efficiency of the new scheme.
The original system was controlled by two timers. One at ground level and one high up the tower. This made re-setting the times inconvenient. And it was not easy to override the timers or change their settings.
The new scheme has only one astronomical timer which is in a convenient location at ground level. A simple switch has been designed which makes it easy to override the timer when needed without touching the timer, which the client likes as many people are confused by timers. This simple switch gives the church the easy option of keeping the lighting on for longer into the evening or turning it off, as needed, as many events happen around the church which sometimes need extra light or no light.
The scheme was funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.
“Great stuff- the lights look great.”
Alison Gregory. The Northbank BID, project managers and fund organisers. alison@thenorthbank.london
