Celebrating Contrast and Daylight Variability in Contemporary Architectural Design: A Typological Approach

The perceptual performance of architecture can be greatly altered by the ephemeral quality of daylight. Unlike artificial light sources, which can be adjusted to meet performance criteria regardless of geographic location and time of day, daylight is a variable source of illumination. When used to illuminate the static environment of a building, sunlight can dramatically alter our perception of interior architecture. Despite a wide range of daylight design strategies, neither high nor low levels of contrast and variability are synonymous with performance: it is the specific conditions that must be engaged appropriately within the context of each architectural work. While there have been several attempts at quantifying brightness and luminance diversity in daylit architecture (through the use of digital images), we have yet to see a method that can measure the spatial and temporal diversity of light within the visual field. In order to establish the importance of luminous composition within interior architecture, this paper presents a survey of contemporary architecture from around the world to develop a more effective vocabulary about contrast and temporal variability under daylight conditions. This survey allows us to grasp the broad range of design strategies employed within contemporary architecture and develop a matrix of contrast typologies against which each space could be compared on a relative scale from high to low. This matrix allows us to develop a precise language about the composition of perceptual luminosity within each space and helps architects to contextualize and compare the perceptual impacts of daylight within space

A dimensionality reduction method to select the most representative daylight illuminance distributions

One challenge when evaluating daylight distribution is dealing with the large amount of temporal and spatial data, visualisations and variability in illuminances that are assessed in buildings. Using a dimensionality reduction method based on principal component analysis, we identified the most representative annual daylight distributions. We modelled a rectangular room containing an analysis grid of 3200 illuminance sensor points and simulated 3285 different temporal daylight conditions using an annual occupancy schedule ranging from 08:00 to 17:00 with one-hour sampling intervals in two locations: Singapore and Oakland, California. Our approach explained 98 % of the illuminance variability with three daylight distributions in Singapore, and 92 % using six in Oakland, California. Our dimensionality reduction strategy was also generalised using a complex building geometry showing the utility of the method. We think this approach can be used to provide a more efficient and reliable method to analyse daylight performance in building practice

Visualizing Perceptual Dynamics in Architecture

When it comes to value how magnificent buildings are experienced, most designers believe that sunlight is essential. Although architecture is a technical discipline, it lacks a consensus about what quantity and what quality of light are required to make a space efficient

Daylight dynamics to guide early stage design: a user-driven goal-based approach to “good” lighting

More and more refined methods are currently being developed that aim to inform designers about daylighting management in a comprehensive way, many of which try to investigate annual daylighting potential through climate-based modeling. In this paper, we propose to address the issue of dealing with very different quantities all relevant to ‘good’ daylighting performance (illumination potential, glare risks, aesthetics, physiological effects of light) by resorting to a goal-based approach, so that such quantities or metrics can all be evaluated on a relative basis within a single simulation framework and a unique, intuitive and visual format. Specifically, the paper proposes to build upon the goal-based approach adopted by the Lightsolve simulation framework to bring together physical, physiological and perceptual aspects of light around the temporal variability of their effects. A prototype interface is presented that proposes an interactive, highly visual simulation environment in which to integrate these goal-based concepts. The paper also describes the premices of an expert system aiming to guide the user towards improved design solutions. The objective is to support early stage design regarding both conventional aspects of daylight performance such as workplane illuminance, glare and associated solar gains, and unconventional ones such as perceptual or non-visual effects of daylight, all considered in combination within a unified framework of analysis

A review of daylighting strategies in schools: state of the art and expected future trends

The study of daylight conditions within educational buildings has been a topic of interest since the nineteenth century in western countries, and European ones in particular. Although it has been argued that providing a view outside—or even using daylight instead of more stable and manageable artificial light—could reduce students’ performance without providing a pleasant and healthy environment, nowadays it seems that a large consensus upon the need to design well daylit spaces is being reached. This paper reviews how the research community has tackled the task of understanding and solving the complex relationships amongst local climate, users’ needs and design constraints in school buildings by showing the different approaches used and technological solutions suggested. The reported case studies, based either on experimental measurements or on simulations, highlight the need of a comprehensive approach to the topic to fully understand the non‐trivial requirements of a daylit educational environment

Unweaving the human response in daylighting design

Daylighting as a research topic situates itself at the interface between psycho-physiological and environmental factors, bringing together questions relevant to architectural design and building engineering, but also to human physiology and behavior. While daylighting has a strong impact on human health and well-being, and an undeniable association with (subjective) emotional delight and perceived quality of a space, it is also highly dynamic and variable in nature, based on a combination of predictable (sun course) and stochastic (weather) patterns. This makes it both a challenging and essential aspect of how “performative” a space can be considered. This paper aims to discuss selected research developments regarding how architectural engineering and other domains of science could be more strongly bridged to address the need for meaningful decision support in daylighting design: how can we better integrate the complexity of human needs in buildings into effective design strategies for daylit spaces? As a basis for discussion and to illustrate this overview, it describes a unified goal-based approach in an attempt to address the multiplicity of perspectives from which daylighting performance can – and should – be evaluated in building design. Through five very different perspectives ranging from task-driven illumination or comfort to human-driven health and perception, it proposes a simulation and visualization framework in which one can start approaching these from an integrated approach

Human-Driven Daylighting: research perspectives and outlook

Daylighting opens up a range of topics of investigation at the interface between architecture and building technology, especially when focusing on the integration of building performance in design. While it has a strong impact on human health and well-being, and an undeniable association with (subjective) emotional delight and perceived quality of a space, it is also highly dynamic and variable in nature, based on a combination of predictable (sun course) and stochastic (weather) patterns, which makes it both a challenging and essential aspect of how “performative” a space can be considered. This paper aims to provide an overview of research perspectives regarding how architectural design, building engineering and other domains of science could be more strongly bridged to address the need for meaningful metrics in architectural design and propose approaches to integrate the complexity of human needs in buildings into effective design and decision-making support

A Simulation-Based Workflow to Assess Human-Centric Daylight Performance

This paper will present an annual simulation-based workflow for assessing human perceptual and non-visual responses to daylight across a series of view positions in an architectural case study. Through the integration of mathematical models used to predict visual interest and non-visual health potential, this paper will introduce an automated workflow to assess an array of view positions (located at eye level) under varied sky conditions and across multiple view directions to analyze the predicted impacts of daylight on perception and health in architecture. This approach allows for a spatial and occupant centric analysis of daylight using an integrated simulation-based approach