July 27, 2018

Saks Brickell is a Beauty!

Oculus Light Studio project, Saks Brickell,  is featured in this month’s Contract Lighting Magazine, as “The latest Saks Fifth Avenue in the East boasts an innovative lighting design that mirrors this unique neighborhood in greater downtown Miami.”

How did our lighting design team highlight thousands of designer shoes, bags and clothing for a 70,000 sf luxury department store you may ask? Well, it was certainly no easy task and required many a fixture to be aimed on precariously tall ladders by our team. The final result is stunning and was certainly worth the hard work to achieve the lighting’s creative solutions,  not to mention being recognized by the Shop! Retail Environments Award in 2017.

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July 10, 2018

A Day in the Life of an Oculus Intern

Ruoxiao Zeng is our student intern this year, and we feel lucky to have her here for the summer season before she goes back to her busy school schedule studying for a Master’s in Building Science at the University of Southern California! We asked her a few questions about her background, experience so far at Oculus, and why she has a general interest in lighting. We hope that after her internship she will consider a career as a lighting designer.

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June 25, 2018

Oculus Wins 4 Awards at 2018 Lumen West

We are happy and honored to announce that Oculus Light Studio was a recipient of four awards at the 2018 Lumen West Awards Dinner on Saturday, June 23, 2018 at the Millenium Biltmore Hotel.  The Illuminating Engineering Society of LA and Orange County (IESLA & IESOC)  yearly hosts this big awards night for the best of Southern California lighting design.

Award of Excellence – Energy & Environmental Design for RDC/S111 Urban Office
Award of Merit for RDC/S111 Urban Office
Award of Merit for AT&T San Francisco Flagship
Award of Merit for Parasol Park

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June 1, 2018

RDC/Studio111 Office Wins Calibre Design Award

International Interior Design Association Southern California Chapter hosted their 2018 Calibre Design Awards on Friday, May 18th, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. We are happy to announce that our lighting design project, RDC/Studio111 Office, won in the Work-Medium Category at the Gala Event! Congratulations to RDC/Studio111, and a special thanks for including us as part of the design team.

You can view all the winning projects here!

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May 21, 2018

Saks Brickell Stars in Hip Hop Music Video

Can you spot the Oculus lighting design project, Saks Brickell Miami, in Drake’s new music video for his hit single, God’s Plan? We sure did!

Around 2.28 mins into the video try and catch Drake inside the luxury department store as he giving away his entire music video budget to his fans, we thought it was pretty cool!

We can’t blame this spot for being chosen… the twinkling of the ceiling downlights and chandeliers are a great backdrop for the hip hop star and of course the lighting needed to  be ‘camera ready’ for the music video set.

Watch it for yourself!

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May 18, 2018

Lightfair 2018 in the ‘Windy City’

By Archit Jain

Sarah Wang and I were the official Oculus representatives at Lightfair in Chicago.  It was fun walking through a large variety of luminaires, controls and components at the show. Even better was to catch up with old friends and acquaintances.

As lighting design firms go, we are lucky to be considered important enough for many manufacturers to come by our office regularly to keep us appraised of their newest products and advances.  However, Lightfair still gives us a wide overview into upcoming products and general trends in the lighting industry.

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April 30, 2018

April 20, 2018

Oculus Outing: Reality Projector & Blue Ribbon Sushi

The Oculus Team spent a lovely late afternoon and early evening outside of the office. We traveled to the Marciano Art Foundation to view and be inspired by Olafur Elliason’s Reality Projector and afterwards visited Blue Ribbon Sushi Bar, one of our award-winning hospitality projects!

At Marciano Art Foundation we were awed by the expansiveness of Ellison’s warehouse-sized video projection. To experience light and art combined, was right up our alley as lighting designers! According to MAF’s website, “For his exhibition at the foundation, titled Reality projector (2018), Eliasson has conceived of a seemingly simple, yet complex installation that uses projected light and the existing architecture of the space to create a dynamic shadow play. The artwork references the space’s former function as a theater as well as the history of filmmaking in the city by turning the entire space into an abstract, three-dimensional film.

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April 6, 2018

Oculus Project Wins Shop! 2018 Design Gold Award

We are proud to announce that Oculus Light Studio is a recipient of a 2018 Shop! Retail Gold Award. Per their website, “The Shop! Awards Competitions recognize the best new designs in retail environments and experiences. Considered by many as the “Academy Awards” of the retail design and brand marketing industries, we offer four award programs, each celebrating a different area of design expertise.”

2018 Gold Award Winner
Roots, York, ON, Canada
Congratulations to: CallisonRTKL

March 27, 2018

Urban Makeover of Historic Culver Studios

Collaborating with architect Gensler, Oculus is excited to be involved in the redesign of the historic Culver Studios to transform into a contemporary urban campus. The impressive future tenant was announced as Amazon Studios and its affiliated creative firms. Tech and now media-streaming giant, Amazon will be leasing 280,000 sf of space at the 14-acre campus located at 9336 Washington Blvd.

There will be some updated design with new construction, yet the more iconic buildings will remain intact and be utilized by the new tenant. The overall lighting design will reflect some of the studios’ golden movie-age roots while providing a contemporary feel, and will help in beginning a new chapter in this studio’s rich history!

March 12, 2018

Archit Speaking at IESLA Pechakucha

Check out Oculus Light Studio principal, Archit Jain, speak at Illuminating Engineering Society Los Angeles event ‘What Inspires Me, Powered by PechaKucha’, from 6:00 pm – 9:00 pm on March 15th

“Come join us for an evening of inspirational exchange. We will have a variety of presenters sharing their passions: lighting designers, architects, lighting reps, & lighting manufacturers. Every day as an architect or lighting designer requires inspiration, but where do these individuals find it?”

 

March 6, 2018

The Very Anticipated Burbank Commons

This new Burbank center is offering up a lot of potential, from family-friendly gathering spot to corporate event space. Not too mention beer fans will be ecstatic with the craft breweries moving in!

According to this recent Los Angeles Times article, “The proposed project would involve demolishing the existing 70,000-square-foot former AmeriCold cold storage warehouse and replace it with 33,000 square feet of event space, a roller rink, 19,000 square feet of restaurant, craft beer pub, café and special-event space and about 47,000 square feet of outdoor space where the public can congregate and eat.”

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February 23, 2018

Reaching New Heights with BCG DTLA

A very nice write-up was recently done by Light Show West of our BCG Office project in DTLA. The article describes the many opportunities and challenges to transforming this corporate office environment into something truly unique. Working within dizzying heights and strict light levels, the team got creative and came up with solutions for the varying spaces. Striking focal features to the office include concealed LED striplights along stairways and an RGB programmable skylight that accentuates the 50′ high lobby.

“On the 51st floor, you can see 360 degree views: the mountains and the ocean, from downtown to Long Beach….You’re looking north at 50 ft of glass on the 51st floor of a downtown office tower. Where else would you find a space like that?” Scott Hatton is quoted.

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February 7, 2018

Recent Projects Up On Site!

A few new good ones up on the website, including a music-lovers dream work space, a hip and collaborative design firm with a Platinum LEED certification and an immersive “Store of the Future”. Check them out on our projects page!

Fender HQ, Los Angeles, CA

RDC/Studio 111 Offices, Long Beach, CA

AT&T Store of the Future, San Francisco, CA

January 15, 2018

January 4, 2018

Scott Hatton in IES Panel Discussion

And the Award Goes to…..An Evening Panel Discussion with Lighting Designers

January 18, 2018 @ 6:00 pm – 9:00 pm

About:
As a warm up to the award season, please join us for a panel discussion with last year’s award recipients. It will be an informative and inspiring discussion with the project designers. Hear from the designer’s in their own words how the project came to be. And get the inside view as to why these projects were selected by the judges.”

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December 15, 2017

Finding Our Happy Place

To celebrate the holidays, the Oculus Team ventured out to DTLA and ‘Instagram-ed’ our way through Happy Place, an immersive set of multi-room installations meant for taking your best selfie. We got goofy with our picture taking, including finding Scott hanging upside down like a bat from a bedroom ceiling. Overall, we enjoyed meandering through the different rooms and left with big smiles on all of our faces!

To cap the night off, we ate a large family-style meal at Officine Brera,which provided a festive and inviting atmosphere to celebrate the holiday season. Not to mention, we had the chance to experience basking in the warm glow of Oculus’ award-winning lighting design! The Northern Italian inspired cuisine was super satisfying and we all ate until we could eat no more. continued→

December 7, 2017

November 20, 2017

November 6, 2017

Welcome Our Newest Team Members!

We are so very pleased to welcome aboard our newest lighting designers, Likhitha Rangaswamy and Karl ‘Nico’ Meyer, to the Oculus Family. Acquiring some bright young talent is certainly exciting!

To find out more about all of our lighting designers, visit our People page.

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