ATHENS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT FACADE LIGHTING

David Williams said, “All human life can be found in an airport”.

The Athens International Airport (AIA) also named Eleftherios Venizelos, is the gateway to great destinations worldwide, and the first visitor’s experience after they are landing in Athens, also the last as the leave. An especially important landmark and one of the most visited places in Greece as it receives thousands of visitors and passengers daily.

The extension of the South Wing of the existing AIA Main Terminal Building is a newly completed end piece of high-quality architecture, which is revealed gradually whilst approaching the airport from the main road. This new structure, designed by the architects A. Tombazis and AVW.

The architectural approach of the exterior surface of the building cell is defined by the element of the louvers. Those louvers are rotated progressively around their pivoting point, revealing views from, and to the building.

Our lighting concept key factor was to illuminate the structure invisibly and elegantly at night without revealing the position of the light source, so we chose to integrate the luminaires in a discrete way that will make them part of the architecture and also to disappear in the daytime. We designed a luminaire that is part of the louver itself, avoiding in that way to intervene in the architecture. These vertical luminaires/surfaces are made of a special custom fixture that features a diffuse finish. It has 2 lines of RGBW module LEDs behind a frosted glass and it is mounted to the frame of the cement boards of every louver constituting the end part of it.

The final size and shape of this custom linear luminaire, has been decided considering the requirements of the mounting details as well as the fixture’s durability in exterior applications and severe weather environment.

The lighting proposal has endless possibilities. Using a state-of-the-art technology dynamic lighting, for programming seasonal scenarios is allowing light to communicate different visual messages to the airport’s guests, highlighting not only the architectural creation but also the power of light as a universal means of communication between people.