Founded in 1545 by the Venetian Republic, Orto Botanico di Padova is the world's oldest academic botanical garden still in its original location. Affiliated with the University of Padua, it currently covers around 22,000 square metres, and is known for its special collections and historical design.

The opening event was lit by Lorenzo Lissandron, a freelance LD and technician who undertakes all architectural lighting schemes for the University of Padua.

For this one, he worked closely with rental company Tondello Tecnologie, also based near Padua, and supplier of all the LEDWashes.

LEDWashes were specified because the brief was to highlight the impressive building with a series of sympathetic colours – greens and blues, aquas – both primaries and secondaries to blend in with the foliage, and also because an eco-friendly lightsource was – naturally – essential.

The LEDWash 600 ticked all the boxes and also had the power and punch to be able to illuminate large areas throughout the interior of the vast building, and the high quality and homogenized nature of the light output was also considered.

With its extremely low power consumption and LED lightsource, apart from anything else, it was the perfect “green” fixture for the job!

Furthermore, the choice of lighting reflected the high tech elements of the new building, which embraces several interactive communication and new-media concepts to providing educational content for visitors focused on plant life and biodiversity.

The fixtures were rigged on a series 1.5 metre high custom trussing towers dotted around the huge and impressive space, constructed from white steel and glass which houses five different greenhouses with plant specimens and vegetation from different microclimates.