The team at Patek Philippe was impressed with our work on another luxury storefront in the Mayfair area of London, and we were introduced by the contractor involved in both projects. Our scope constituted the replacement of the existing lights in the brand’s display cases to better exhibit their luxury watches.
The primary objective of the project was to light Patek Philippe’s watches in a considered manner. A warmer light will make gold appear brighter but make a silver watch look dull, so we developed a new product to meet this specification: the ‘Twin-Headed’ G40 spotlight, which can project varying levels of color temperature, allowing for the flexibility to blend between 3000K and 4000K. By installing multiple lighting point sources, we were also able to create more specularity within the precious stones on display, thereby enhancing their natural sparkle; the SlimLight Pro picture light accentuated this effect by flooding each vitrine with the highest color rendition of light (98+ CRI).
“We were able to consider each timepiece as a work of art and could light each with the precision and quality expected in a gallery.”
The biggest challenge was installing our products within existing display cases, as they needed to be of a particularly low profile as not to distract from the watches; thus, when developing the G40 spotlight, we designed it in such a way that it could be installed inconspicuously, on a low-voltage lighting track that offered maximum versatility in a very confined space. Another challenge was the time pressure—to minimize disruption to the store, we were tasked with installing our lights across two consecutive nights.
A necessary consideration when working in a retail space is a balance between appearance and functionality. With Patek Philippe in particular, security is a major factor—we opted to tune all lights in the store using Bluetooth Casambi, so that they could be universally controlled from a smartphone app, meaning that the display cases could remain securely closed. Furthermore, window lighting needs to be very bright and directed to counter inevitable daylight, which we achieved through powerful LED lighting, which is also more economical, with the G40 requiring just 4 watts and the SlimLight Pro picture lights requiring 14 watts.
Photos: Andrew Beasley
A custom spotlight was made to project multiple color temperatures.
Unlike many stores where watches and jewelry are displayed in groups, the products at this store are habitually displayed independently of each other so as not to distract from their craftsmanship. We were able to consider each timepiece as a work of art and could light each with the precision and quality expected in a gallery, drawing on our experience lighting masterpieces at The Wallace Collection, the National Trust, and Frieze London. A Patek Philippe watch is a sculpture-of-sorts, but one that requires a specific approach to lighting—whereas a large-scale work by Anish Kapoor [a British-Indian sculptor known for large, stainless-steel works such as Cloud Gate in Chicago], for example, necessitates light reflected off adjacent surfaces—the smaller surfaces of a watch should be lit directly to accentuate its aesthetic.
Multiple lighting sources allow precious materials to sparkle.
Our work with Patek Philippe has influenced our approach to several retail projects. The G40 spotlight has since been installed at G Collins & Sons in Royal Tunbridge Wells in Kent, England, and at Symbolic & Chase on Old Bond Street in London.
Window-display illumination is controlled via Bluetooth for extra security.
