Two illumination highlights and the overall lighting of the record-breaking Norwegian Bliss ensured our nomination for the German Lighting Design Award 2019.
The Norwegian Bliss invites you to marvel: It is currently the ninth largest cruise ship ever built. It was therefore clear to us that her lighting design also had to be at a very high level. Our key to the convincing lighting concept of the Norwegian Bliss was a combination of custom-made products and interdisciplinary collaboration.
Our challenge in developing a convincing lighting concept was the many different areas of the Norwegian Bliss – because their lighting requirements differ greatly. The “usual” areas of a first-class cruise ship of this level alone, i.e. bars, restaurants, the spa, the shopping area, the casino, the pool area, the theater and others, each required a special approach, a lot of know-how and a sure instinct on our part. But that is by no means everything that makes Norwegian Bliss special. 
LIGHTING DESIGN FOR THE HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NORWEGIAN BLISS
Norwegian Cruise Lines’ impressively large cruise ship offers its guests a very special leisure experience: Because they can enjoy a really different, faster, view of the sea on a go-kart track in the ship’s outdoor area, which extends over two decks. We were asked to make this highlight perfect.
We not only developed lighting that meets the requirements of a go-kart track, but also a real media highlight. We equipped the outer lanes of the go-kart track with media tubes that play content tailored to the activities on the track. The light reacts to every movement on the track: for example, a yellow flag is simulated when the race is interrupted to warn the driver.
As the resolution of the Mediatubes is very low at just a few centimetres, they can display very fine images. The special feature: the driver can only capture these images from a steep angle – when many tubes are positioned one behind the other and merge into one large overall image.
THE GIGANTIC CHANDELIER OF THE NORWEGIAN BLISS: A FASCINATING CHALLENGE
In the atrium of the Norwegian Bliss, there is another lighting highlight that really challenged us. It is a chandelier consisting of 220,000 glass crystals that have been individually and manually applied to the chrome-plated, laser-cut steel. We designed and developed the chandelier in cooperation with Tillberg Design of Sweden and the manufacturer Preciosa.
For the installation of the chandelier, certain extras came into play that have to be taken into account in lighting concepts for cruise ships: We used rubber dampers to connect the entire construction to the ceiling without vibrations. In this way, we were able to prevent the four-ton chandelier from swinging upwards due to the typical movements of a ship.
We chose two products to illuminate the chandelier. LED module chains now provide neutral white lighting from the inside, which is supplemented by RGB flex strips located in the outer glass tubes. This structure is divided into two levels, which can be controlled individually. To perfect the effect of the chandelier, we adapted the lighting to the time of day and programmed it to change automatically eight times a day. During planning, it was also important to us that the large chandelier could be accessed from the inside so that it could be easily maintained.
For us, the lighting concept for the Norwegian Bliss is one of the best examples of the high demands that lighting design for cruise ships places on us every day.