Michael Cohen

Eckstein Hall is a four-story, 200,000 SF contemporary building for modern law. Schuler Shook provided lighting design for the four-story central atrium, library reading room and mock court.

The central atrium required flexible lighting for multiple activities including studying, lectures, and recognition dinners. The space is highlighted with pendant clusters, providing visually comfortable ambient light on vertical and horizontal surfaces. Integrated downlights with glare shielding provide multiple light level options for the variety of activities in the space. Indirect uplight completes the space.

A linear sconce at the stair tower visually reinforces the strong vertical architectural form and helps illuminate the stair treads

The lighting design in the spacious third-floor library reading room provides users a visually comfortable experience through a combination of slender bookshelf task lighting, downlights and wall wash accents, and custom pendants that acknowledge the traditional chandelier of the former Law School. In addition, the pendants create a beacon for the school visible from surrounding neighborhoods and freeways.

Excelsior & Grand is a mixed-use development, with 5 story buildings consisting of residential units, retail space, restaurants, and plazas. The development is centered along a 600 foot pedestrian-friendly, town green.

Schuler Shook developed a unique lighting approach to create a dynamic, yet unified interior and exterior lighting design for this multi-phased project. The exterior lighting design included landscape, building facades, balconies, entries, and sculptures.

T‑Rex is an interactive and immersive themed restaurant and retail attraction. Life-sized animatronic dinosaurs, mammoth and other creatures are found in specially themed spaces or ​“zones” such as the Geothermal Kitchen of Fire, the Shark Bar, Fern and Sequoia Forests, and the Children’s Archeological Dig Site. The lighting scheme provides drama and task illumination, complex show programming, and sustainable maintenance.

In the Geothermal zone, natural gas flames erupt from rock fissures. Enhanced impact is provided by flame-effect motion projectors illuminating themed elements. Geothermal activity continues with the fiery LED animation of translucent sculpted lava, juxtaposed behind a cool blue ​“ice melt” waterfall.

The Shark Bar’s giant octopus has animatronic tentacles and provides task lighting through end-emitting fiber optics mounted in its suction cups. LED’s animate the bar in subtle waves.

Other lighting elements include water ripple-effects and ocean tones, internally lit jellyfish providing table lighting, the ice cave’s translucent glowing walls, projected fir and pine cone images in the Sequoia Forest, luminous planets, and internally lit asteroid fixtures in the retail space.

Schuler Shook designs the lighting for the themed Rainforest Cafés worldwide, usually including the interior and exterior of the restaurant, plus a retail area.

The Rainforest Café pictured here is located in Downtown Disney, Anaheim, California. It is a 30,000 square foot free standing restaurant, bar and retail space. The interior restaurant surrounds a three-story atrium with ​“Atlas Man” and a waterfall. The exterior space is inviting with a trellised patio. Both the interior and exterior theme was inspired by the architectural ruins of indigenous Central American peoples.