Architectural Lighting Designer Profile – Motoko Ishii

Motoko Ishii is an important and influential Architectural Lighting Designer for a number of reasons. She is famous for her lighting design artistry, as well as her accomplishments beyond the scope of her lighting projects. Motoko Ishii was able to break through the male dominated architectural community in Japan, which at the time did not welcome women into the industry. Not only did she break through the mould, but she also became a dominant authority in the architectural lighting design industry.

She went on to create her lighting design firm, Motoko Ishii Lighting Design Inc., which is headquartered in Tokyo. Her firm has received numerous international awards including more than 30 awards from the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America (IESNA). She has also won many domestic prizes such as the Illuminating Engineering Society of Japan for the Diffusion of Lighting project, as well as the Tokyo Metropolitan Prize of Culture from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government to name just a few.

Her seamless integration of complex and innovative technology has resulted in a visual aesthetic that was very successful in bringing additional personality and dimensionality to the original structure. She was also one of the first lighting designers to use colored light in outdoor applications. Some of her largest event designs include the Expo of 1985 in Tsukuba Japan, the light-up festival of Yokohama Japan, and Japan Flora 2000. She was also the lighting designer for the Japan cities of Osaka, Hakodate, Himeji and Kurashiki, as well as the gasshō-zukuri village at Shirakawa. Other major projects include the Osaka and Himeji Castles; the Akashi Straits and the Yokohama Bay Bridges; the Heisei Building at the Tokyo National Museum; the Gifu World Fresh Water Aquarium; the station building of Tokyo Station; Roppongi Hills Mori Tower, and Yebisu Garden Place. Visit her site at motoko-ishii.co.jp for more information.

Here are just a few of her lighting designs: