11. September 2018
Nimbus luminaires are lighting up an experimental residential module that meets all the criteria of sustainable construction. It has been designed to serve future generations as a "material stock".
Our resources are becoming increasingly scarce, a fact which the construction world also has to face. The UMAR (Urban Mining & Recycling) experimental unit recently opened in Switzerland shows how things may develop. It is a residential module made of separable, reusable, recyclable or compostable materials. For the lighting, the designers opted for various Nimbus LED luminaires, which support the sustainability philosophy behind the experimental residential unit.
The UMAR experimental unit is embedded in the NEST research and innovation building on the campus of the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (Empa). Individual research and innovation modules are implemented in the basic structure according to the plug-and-play principle. They act as real-life test laboratories.
One of these units – the Urban Mining & Recycling Experimental Unit (or UMAR for short) – was designed by the architect and engineer Werner Sobek together with Dirk Hebel and Felix Heisel from KIT. UMAR is experimenting with construction using completely reusable, recyclable or compostable materials and products that can be separated and returned to their respective material cycles without leaving behind any residue. The key idea is that future buildings will not only provide a place to live and work but, at the same time, will also serve as a material stock for the next generation. The designers also wanted to realise aesthetically pleasing architecture and create a correspondingly high-quality interior. The materials used include a new type of insulation panel made of mushroom mycelium, innovative recycled stone, recycled insulation material or leased carpets.
The experimental unit will act as a "real-life test laboratory" and will be occupied for a specific period by two students. It is lit by over 50 Nimbus luminaires from the Roxxane Home Short, Roxxane Fly, Roxxane Leggera 52 CL and Roxxane Leggera 101 CL ranges as well as by the Cubic 49 ceiling luminaire. These six different luminaires cover all of the unit's different lighting needs. It is the Roxxane Leggera CL, the cableless Winglet CL and the compact Roxxane Fly in particular that allow exceptional flexibility and smart use of light. The latter can be placed absolutely anywhere; it can also be mounted on a wall or magnetically attached to metal surfaces. The concept of batterypowered, cableless luminaires is based on the idea of being ableto take them wherever they are needed without a cable and without the need for laborious installation work. The standard versions of the luminaires in the Roxxane range have a coated surface. Variants without the coating were especially developed for the unit. The Roxxane Home Short, which is actually intended as a wall luminaire, was modified so that, with the aid of a special bracket, it could be used as an app-controlled flexible ceiling luminaire.
At 19:00 on 17 October, the concept of the experimental residential unit will be presented at the Nimbus Group's Mock-Up in Stuttgart, where it will form part of aed Stuttgart's series of evening events entitled "Take. Make. Repeat. Über die Zukunft des Bauens." (On the future of construction).
Further information:
https://www.aed-stuttgart.de/aed-programm.html