Plant-Based Lighting Fresh from its appearance at [d]arc night, David Morgan puts Technilum’s CreilleThat-Grows lighting pole system under the microscope.
P
lant illumination is a well-established part
of the lighting designer’s palette and is often achieved with buried uplights or surfacemounted projectors.
A less familiar approach is using the luminaire itself as both a planter and support structure for the plant as it grows.
Technilum, located in the southern French town of Beziers has recently incorporated both these functions in an elegant and
effective manner, in the customisable version of its Treille lighting pole system, Creille-that-Grows.
Originally founded in 1971 by Guy Jullian, Technilum has been run
as a family-owned business by his daughter Agnes since 1994. The company focus has always been on exterior street and amenity
lighting and early products included conical street lighting poles. Technilum now offers both ‘off-the-shelf’ systems as well as
bespoke designs. Its creative approach enables it to work with
lighting designers and architects on high-end projects around the world.
In the early years, Technilum poles were designed for use with other manufacturers’ luminaires, however in 2010 Technilum introduced
its first LED luminaire and now offers a complete range of poles and lighting elements, all of which are manufactured in France.
The Treille range was originally developed by Technilum in 2007. It was designed in conjunction with French lighting designer, Jean-
François Arnaud, specifically for the Thiais Village project - a large open-air luxury shopping mall in the Paris area. The aim was to provide a high-quality lighting column that would act as both a decorative and functional lighting addition to the project.
Treille (French for trellis) takes its name from its perforated
aluminium structure. Technilum has always used aluminium for
its products and utilised weld-free production techniques from an early stage to avoid weakening the column structure and to avoid
corrosion. Mechanical bolts are used in combination with industrial strength adhesive systems.
The square 177mm x 177mm extruded aluminium profile used for
the Treille system has gentle concave surfaces, adding visual interest while increasing rigidity. Each face of the pole can be perforated by the Technilum in-house water jet facility with a wide variety
of decorative patterns. The system can be used to create complete David Morgan Associates, a Londonbased international design consultancy specialising in luminaire design and development and is also MD of Radiant Architectural Lighting. Email: david@dmadesign.co.uk Web: www.dmadesign.co.uk
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structures as well as various heights of lighting poles and bollards.
Up and down light luminaires are housed within the profile so that the perforations are backlit and provide attractive light patterns on the surrounding surfaces. The housing also serves to protect the luminaires from vandalism and provides space for drivers
