What color is sunlight?
The majority of people—99%, in a casual estimate from Charles Foster, Senior Director at Lightswitch in fact—would say yellow. We draw it, unfailingly, as big yellow circles in the skies of our sketches. Even first-year lighting design students do the same, using yellow gels on stage lights when they’re told to create a sunny scene.
But sunlight isn’t yellow. It’s a cool, vivid white. Somehow, our perception of something as ubiquitous as sunlight doesn’t match reality. For lighting designers like Foster, lighting design education starts here: unlearning everything you thought you knew about light.
We sat down with Foster to talk about all things light, color, and perception throughout his lighting design career—including his recent work at CATCH, the star-studded, Instagram-worthy restaurant at the Las Vegas’ Aria Resort.
To start off, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your design philosophy?
I got into lighting design about 20 years ago. I started with a theatrical background, working on and off Broadway in New York. Somewhere along the line I transitioned away from theatre towards themed hospitality and architecture. My general philosophy is that all that matters to any given project is how successful it is. Of course, this varies by project. If it’s a live event, success may be about providing a spectacle, or creating an engaging story. If it’s a more permanent installation like a restaurant, it’s about the comfort of the guests, how well the space works together, and ultimately, how profitable that business is.
How do you approach a design project? Are there any recurring principles you can share?
On any project, dollars per square foot is a major concern. That said, we try to remind ourselves to always think about it as memories per square foot. People have so many choices for how to use their time, so it's up to designers to create truly exceptional experiences that are worth leaving the house for. Of course, there’s no formula for what makes a restaurant comfortable or welcoming, but our goal is always to balance the practical concerns of owners, interior designers, and end-users to create something special.
Simplicity is another principle of ours. At CATCH, a lot of ideas were presented—good ideas—but it was often the simplest ones that made it all the way. Just because you have a color-changing fixture doesn’t mean you have to use every color in it. I never want to draw attention to the lighting unless it’s an installation about the lighting. For a restaurant project, you don’t even want people to notice the light—and in many cases, they don’t want to see it either. They just want to feel a space is right without seeing the technology of why.
That’s an interesting concept, when light should be seen and when it should be invisible. With CATCH specifically, it seems like it’s a see-and-be-seen restaurant, with Instagram-worthy moments. Can you tell us how you approached creating that balance—a comfortable dining experience that still sparks visual interest?
CATCH was definitely conceived of as a restaurant that people would want to take photographs in, and that was part of the design mandate. The fairy light-covered entry archway is intended to be a dynamic place to take photos. But that always poses a challenge, because photography lighting oftentimes doesn’t look great in person, and vice versa. Designers love contrast, and cameras don’t.
Of course, the solution isn’t to create a space where everything is at a similar level of intensity—that’s the last thing we want. The goal is a visually compelling space where you see one architectural detail, and then another, and then another, all building up into one great experience—and that’s never going to happen if a space is flat. Even though CATCH is a space with visible lights, there are also hidden features. Sometimes creating that balance is a case of “Focus on what I’m doing with my right hand and not my left.”