The Atlas of Light Oper­a­tions builds a cat­a­logue of numer­ous cus­tom lights that was designed for var­i­ous projects over the years. Much like City is in the Details, this com­pendi­um looks at each object indi­vid­u­al­ly and as a col­lec­tion. Born out of the insuf­fi­cien­cy of ‘off-the-shelf’ prod­ucts, each cus­tom light solves a specific design moment/problematic while inher­ent­ly express­ing the unique cul­ture and expec­ta­tion of its host space. The com­pendi­um ulti­mate­ly chal­lenges the idiom that a detail is defined as a micro­cosm of its larg­er host archi­tec­ture (Edward Ford, 2011) in sup­port of an argu­ment that sees details as con­struc­tions of cul­tur­al­ly specific forms and mate­ri­als that only find mean­ing when read against their archi­tec­tur­al con­text – often in con­trast to it.

Each cus­tom light fixture is charged with per­form­ing more than just giv­ing light. This is one of the main objec­tives for these unique ele­ments. The true test is if the con­text changes, the object los­es mean­ing.