A Bright Idea

Sculpturing Light And Shadow For A Dramatic Interior

November 22, 1997|By Arrol Gellner, Chronicle Features.

Inside the great Gothic cathedral in Cologne, Germany, begun in 1248, you walk into the base of the north tower, towards a cramped spiral stairway of stone.

It is very dark. You begin to climb the steep flight of steps to the spire more than 500 feet overhead. At intervals, tiny window slits cast a dusty shaft of light into the blackness.

After a seemingly interminable climb, you pass through a heavy plank door. Suddenly you find yourself in brilliant sunlight.

You're standing beneath the towering fretwork of the spire, 500 feet above Cologne.

The sun streams through the openings in the spire's Gothic tracery, casting fantastic patterns of light all around you. After the long, dark climb, the effect is otherworldly. You have the transition from darkness to light.

Cologne Cathedral offers a grand example of one of the most ethereal yet powerful attributes of great architecture: light.

The Gothic cathedral, with its superb interplay of light, dark, pattern, and color, probably represents the ultimate use of light in architecture.

But the same basic principles can add interest to residential design as well.

Because light effects don't rely on scale for impact, they can be applied to any building, however humble.

- First, there must be contrast in light levels to achieve drama.

A uniformly bright series of spaces will be cheerful, but it'll also be bland because there is no gradation of light level.

On the other hand, passing through a darker space before entering a light one will redouble the impact of a bright.

This can be done by intentionally limiting the size of windows in anterooms such as foyers and halls.

It's also a good opportunity to use special window shapes such as circles or octagons.

Just as the dark, somber interior of a Gothic cathedral contrasts with the brilliant light that enters through its stained-glass windows, a small but bright window can add great drama to a relatively dark space by providing a very high contrast of light and dark.

- Introducing pattern is a subtle and evocative way to use light.

In Gothic architecture, stone tracery casts intricate patterns of light and shadow.

In a residential setting, window muntins (the pieces that divide the glass), leaded or patterned glass, or a pierced screen shading a window can provide interesting shadow patterns in interior spaces.

These patterns will change as the sun moves across the sky, casting an ever-varying arabesque of light and dark on interior surfaces.

- Finally, introducing color can add richness to the quality of light within a space.

For example, a small beveled glass panel suspended in a window will cast jewel-like rainbow effects on interior surfaces that will vary with the time of day.

Or, for a bolder effect, stained-glass pieces can be suspended over the fullarea of windows.

If you windows are divided by muntins, a less expensive alternative to beveled or stained glass is to use colored glass in certain panes--for example, across the top row.

In either case, for the most dramatic effects, choose windows that receive bright sun.