Bringing the light into winter

By Nadia Dimattina

Docklands’ new icon 888 Collins St will light up for five nights to celebrate Winter Solstice.

From June 20-25, the Light House will be illuminated with festive colours for 10 minutes each hour.

Creative director for Ramus Illumination, Bruce Ramus, said his display would take people on a journey.

“It takes us on a season’s journey from the autumn into the winter, into the darkness of winter. The winter solstice marks the darkest point so you can get a sense of how the season has shifted to this darkest point and then emerging into spring,” he said.

Mr Ramus believes the Winter Solstice light display will reflect what is important to the Docklands community.

“Personally, I think that what is important [in Docklands] is a sense of light. One of the things about the Docklands, is that it has grown up in quite a hurry and the corridors of light are so important to the quality of the energy in the Docklands and so one of the things that this building brings is that energy,” he said.

Mr Ramus describes the display as “relatively abstract” in the way it will be presented but it will give the “the Docklands a little sense of sparkle and wonder”.

On every other night of the week, the 888 Collins St site illuminates with a real-time weather display.

“It interprets the weather through light because we have a weather station on the roof of the building and so we gather the data from the weather site and we drive the lights using that data,” Mr Ramus said.

The Winter Solstice display is similar to the regular weather display as they are both environmentally friendly, with the entire building being illuminated from the energy produced by solar panels installed on the building.

“We want this to be sustainable not only from an energy use perspective but socially sustainable,” Mr Ramus said.

Mr Ramus advises locals to go and see his light show display, as it is a rare illumination.

“I think it is a unique space in Melbourne and there is no other building in the world that does this,” he said.

The light show will run from 5pm to midnight and will be best viewed from Buluk Park.