Education as a Lighting Designer (illi 2018 Intensive Course)

by Marc Haile

One of the messages I try to send with Eldorado Outdoor Lighting is that we are exclusively a lighting company. While I do enjoy landscape design and other aspects of the outdoor trades, nothing quite captures my imagination like lighting. I chose to focus entirely on lighting and nothing else, because I believe lighting done right requires a specialization in that field. This means being an expert in the trade in order to give our clients the very best lighting possible. Manufacturing trends, technology, industry standards, and continuing education are all things I try to stay current with to achieve the professionalism expected in a specialized field. There are a number of organizations, trade shows, and courses one can attend to stay current with their design skills. Recently, I was fortunate enough to be a part of one such course that I believe is the best in our industry; The International Landscape Lighting Institute's intensive course at the University of Oklahoma.

Janet Lennox Moyer is a renowned landscape lighting designer and author of The Landscape Lighting Book. To put it simply, there is no other book that compares when talking about information pertaining to landscape lighting. It is, quite literally, a text book covering just about everything there is to cover on the subject. Jan founded illi (International Landscape Lighting Institute) as an educational platform for lighting design and, over the years has hosted some of the best lighting designers in the country.

I read The Landscape Lighting Book when I first started Outdoor Lighting and wanted to take the course, and so finally, this last October I was able to attend at the University of Oklahoma, were the course has found a new home as a university outreach program.

The course is a five day whirlwind of lighting design. Both in a classroom environment and in the field, covering everything from equipment manufacturers, electrical requirements, lighting design, client interaction, and even a demonstration on tree care and pruning! Not much was overlooked, and it was a truly professional experience. The class centered around a lighting mock-up of scenes on the University of Oklahoma campus. The course was an absolute success and I feel privileged to have taken it. It taught me so much as a lighting designer and I met some great people, both mentors and other attendee's, and I can't wait to put everything I learned into practice. I have included a few photos from the course below: