Weymouth Promenade Artistic Lighting

Light the Wey created by Tonkin Liu

December 2019

Dorset Council and Weymouth Town Council held a small celebratory event for the Weymouth Promenade Artistic Lighting Scheme. Open to the public, the celebration took place on Thursday 19 December at 6pm along Weymouth Seafront opposite Alexandra Gardens. Further details can be found here.

November 2019

The new lighting scheme consisting of 28 computer-controlled LED strips has been successfully installed along Weymouth promenade between the Pier Bandstand and the Pavilion. Testing of the scheme is complete and starting from the 14th November, Weymouth bay will be lit up by a series of lighting programmes inspired by the local community.

The lighting artwork amplifies the natural rhythms of Weymouth; programmed using an astronomical clock, the lights will turn on for 30 minutes each day in time with the rising and setting of the sun. In the evening, the lights will remain on until 11:30pm in the winter and 1am in the summer, they will cycle through 10 unique active scenes that celebrate the elements and activities of Weymouth, with gentle ambient scenes in-between.

Now complete, Dorset Council will be gifting the lights to Weymouth Town Council who will be responsible for operating and maintaining the lights. Officers from Weymouth Town Council and Dorset Council are working together to arrange a celebratory event, to be held in December once the general election has taken place. More information will be shared in due course.

August 2019 - Engineers were on site along the Esplanade this week making a start on technical testing of the new lighting scheme. This involved testing the installation methods, the electrical equipment and the wireless technology; all of which need to be fully tested before the team can plan the full installation. Installation of the scheme is still expected to be completed by November.

June 2019 - After a period of unavoidable delays, the new lighting scheme is now back on track and will be installed during the autumn.

Delays have been due to cost and technical issues during the tender process for the manufacture and installation of the scheme, which have now been resolved. The final cost of the project is £265,000. Following approval of its contribution by Weymouth Town Council on 26^th June 2019, this cost is met through the following funding:

£200,000 CCF original grant

£50,000 Dorset Council

£5,000 Dorset Coast Forum

£5,000 Weymouth BID

£5,000 Weymouth Town Council

The next step is to commission the contractor and a programme is set for installation of the new lighting scheme in the autumn, with an expected final launch in November.

Dec 2018 - Weymouth promenade’s new artistic lighting scheme has been given the go ahead by Weymouth & Portland Borough Council’s Planning Committee which was held on 12^th December. W&PBC will now progress with the tender process and are looking to appoint a contractor to supply and install the new seafront scheme and are planning that the new contractor will be in place to start in the new year, with the new scheme installed by late Spring 2019.

Sept 2018 - A planning application for the proposed scheme was submitted to the West Dorset, Weymouth & Portland Planning Portal on the 27th Sept. The application can be viewed on the planning portal, reference number WP/18/00744/FUL and will be open for comment until 18^th October 2018, after which it will be presented to the appropriate Planning Committee for a decision.

Aug 2018 - WPBC Management Committee approved the proposed seafront lighting design on 14th August and subject to a 5-day call-in period, the formal planning process will proceed with a planning application to be submitted by the end of September. The WPBC Management Committee report can be viewed here

July 2018 - Community feedback incorporated into final designs. Designs being prepared to present at August Management Committee for proceed/stop decision.

May 2018 – Community exhibition of the proposed lighting concept for the Weymouth community to share their ideas and comments. The community exhibition feedback report can be viewed here

April 2018 – Art Studio Tonkin Liu appointed to design the new lighting scheme. To follow on from last years’ community engagement, Tonkin Liu's concept was developed further based on feedback gathered during engagement events with schools and a range of community stakeholders with a variety of interests and viewpoints who worked to develop and influence the designs presented at the community exhibition.

Technical demonstration

The seafront lighting design is currently being finalised ready for WPBC Management Committee decision on 14th August. As part of this process, councillors asked to see a basic, functional demonstration of the type of fittings being proposed, in context on the seafront. We arranged for this demonstration to take place as a private session to view a very limited range of sample programmes on one column to help inform their decision at Management Committee. We would like to stress that the demonstration is purely to show specific elements of the potential display to councillors as requested, and is not fully representative of the complete scheme. There will be no further public consultation on the design until the formal planning process begins later in the summer (subject to Management Committee approval).

Community Exhibition

The community exhibition took place on Friday 18th and Saturday 19th May and a number of the community came along to Weymouth Library see the new scheme for the seafront. Thank you for all your thoughts and comments about the new scheme, particularly your thoughts around how the scheme can be programmed to display different colourful patterns of light to celebrate Weymouth’s unique location, activities and natural rhythms.

The exhibition material here on this page is now closed for comment. Your feedback has been collated and a full report can be viewed on this page (Project Information section, right hand side).

You can still view the video below to see the different coloured patterns of light that the design can be programmed to display.

Who are Tonkin Liu?

Tonkin Liu are an award-winning studio with a wealth of experience in creating beautiful lighting schemes in British seaside towns and cities. They showed a great interest in the natural rhythms, heritage and culture of Weymouth when designing their initial concept. Their concept carefully takes into account the community’s aspirations, and works well with the technical constraints of the site.

Tonkin Liu's initial design concept achieves a colourful, affordable, environmentally-friendly design, which uses modern technology to sit comfortably within the context of Weymouth seafront’s Georgian and Victorian architecture.

To find out more about Tonkin Liu, visit their website http://www.tonkinliu.co.uk/

Background

The Weymouth Promenade Lighting project will create an artist-designed lighting scheme along Weymouth promenade to provide a welcoming atmosphere for evening strollers, improve views towards Weymouth Bay and enhance the night-time image of the town and seafront. The scheme's design will be based upon the aspirations of the local community and will create a new, exciting, attractive visual aesthetic to complement the existing lighting scheme, both by day and night.

The project aims to unify three different 'character zones' of the promenade and to draw people along the promenade and out along the footway along the north side of the 'Pavilion' peninsula. The character zones are from Greenhill to the Pier Bandstand (zone 1), from the Pier Bandstand to the end of the Esplanade (zone 2), then from the end of the Esplanade to end of the 'Pavilion peninsula (zone 3).