Scottsdale Senior CenterGranite Reef

City of Scottsdale, Arizona

Architect of Record – Gabor Lorant ArchitectsPhoenix, Arizona

Lighting/Daylighting Design ConsultantRenee Thomas, AIA, LC

RTL Design, LLC*While employed with another firm

RTL Design, LLC was the architectural lighting design practice established by Renee Thomas, AIA, IESNA to provide consulting services to the AED community in the areas the Architectural Lighting Design, Daylighting Design and Architectural Sustainability. The firm’s design practice, established in 2003, was based upon the premise that thoughtfully designed lighted environments highlight great architecture, enhance end-user comfort and productivity and do so with an eye towards good stewardship of the natural environment. RTL Design's methodology is to define the seeing tasks to be performed by the building end-users and explore to what extent those tasks can be facilitated by the creative shaping of both artificial light and “borrowed natural light”. Appropriate lighting design must always achieve supportive seeing environments while working to reduce the project’s energy footprint to the largest extent possible.

Daylight harvesting is one of the primary methods used by architects to enhance the quality of the lighted environment while at the same time reducing the connected loads associated with artificial lighting.  As a licensed architect, Renee Thomas approaches lighting design as a synergistic problem solving exercise in which she carefully examines urban and site context, building siting, architectural envelope design, glazing location and specification, HVAC system design and appropriate lighting & daylighting design strategies to facilitate the creation of the most energy efficient designs practicable.  In working out the design solution Renee employs multiple software tools that permit a high degree of sophistication in the study of artificial lighting and contributed daylight. This predictive modeling technique, ongoing throughout the design process, allows the Owner and the Design Team to have confidence both in the anticipated quality of the lighted environment as well as the projected unit power density as expressed in watts per square foot.

Lighting/Daylighting Design Methodology

While employed by Gabor Lorant Architects, Renee Thomas, AIA, LC served as Architectural Project Manager and Lighting Designer for the Scottsdale Senior Center. This 40,000 square foot multi-use facility was built for the City of Scottsdale and was completed in 2005. This project includes a super-insulated building envelope, high performance glazing to facilitate daylight harvesting and reduce heat load transfer, a high performance HVAC central plant to provide district cooling and roof and translucent shade canopy mounted 50 kW photo-voltaic arrays for on-site power generation.

Design Narrative

Floor Plan

Daylighting of internal building circulation Translucent PV Canopy Array

All photographs by RTL Design, LLC