Lighting design as a specialist field

Doğan Hasol published a piece called “İçmimar Mimara Karşı” (Interior Architect Versus Architect) on his personal website in July. I came across it through an email group I subscribe to. (see: http://bit.ly/9HNQEM) In it, Hasol looks at the relationship between the architecture profession and the specialist fields tied to it. His starting point is the criminal complaint that the İç Mimarlar Odası (the Chamber of Interior Architects) filed with the prosecutor's office against architect Kerem Erginoğlu and architect Hasan Çalışlar. When I read the piece with lighting design in mind, the questions I ran into were interesting.

The first thing I noticed is that lighting design doesn't appear as a specialist field at all. Honestly, this doesn't surprise me, and I can't criticise Doğan Hasol for it either. It's obvious we still have a long way to go before lighting design is accepted and recognised as a profession.

Hasol makes this observation in his piece: “In Türkiye, the scope and limits of the architecture profession are being pushed. Architecture is on its way to getting squeezed between side fields and sub-fields whose areas of authority are not clearly set… Urban Planning, Urban Design, Landscape Architecture, Interior Architecture… All these fields, their limits of authority not fully defined, are trying to fit their positions into legal frameworks. But the frameworks are being drawn so wide that in the end it looks as if architects will have no field of work left.”

As the PLDA association, we have been lobbying for some time to get the Lighting Design profession recognised at European Union level. We can see that sooner or later this profession will also be officially recognised, and its lines will have to be drawn. When we get there, will architects have the same worry? In fact, the profession's boundaries don't only overlap with architects. Electrical engineers may feel they have the same problem. Of course, as someone who believes in this profession, I think both groups should pray for a lighting designer on their projects. I'm sure informed professionals will agree. Someone else who takes on the work on your project that nobody owns, nobody takes responsibility for and nobody can bill for... Who could say no to that?

Going back to Hasol's piece, this sentence made me think: “In a working world where even housewives work professionally today, it is not understandable for interior architects to try to shut out architects.” It struck me as odd that, rather than just complaining about the situation he describes, he used such a belittling phrase. Today the same complaint could be made about the lighting design profession too. Who is a lighting designer, and who offers lighting design as an “independent”, is something we argue about as an industry as well. My position on this has been the same from the start. Like Adam Smith said (and like Turgut Özal, who repeated the phrase a lot in Türkiye), I say “Laissez faire, laissez passer”. So if someone today puts “lighting designer” on their business card and says they offer the service independently of any brand, that's good enough for me. I don't think anyone needs to play judge or prosecutor here. It's enough to take the finished projects, and whether someone lasts, as the measure of success. Don't worry: I don't think anyone who can't or won't deliver the service they claim can hold on in these market conditions. Especially for a profession with fewer than 10 practitioners in our country, a fight over who's who, or a logic of weeding people out from day one, won't work.

In the piece, Hasol agrees with an observation by Adil Öngel, head of the İçmimarlar Odası İstanbul branch: “We work together with the architect, but architects have to choose us.” This, too, has to be the motto of lighting designers. I know some lighting designers prefer to work directly with the client. But one thing is certain: on a project where the architect isn't convinced, the doors to working together won't be very open. I also don't think it's very healthy to position the lighting designer as someone the architect hires. The ideal seems to be a lighting designer who sits under the client but works to the architect's brief.

I thank Doğan Hasol for a piece that got me to write about subjects I've wanted to write about for a long time. I should add a note: what I write here are my own thoughts. I think we need to discuss these subjects more, step by step, for the healthy growth of the profession. Please feel free to share your comments.

Stay with the light until our next issue…

Emre Güneş
Professional Lighting Design Türkiye