Earlier this week we took on challenge of lighting the 16-foot tall ‘The Spirit of Progress’ statue that caps off the 4-story tower on top of the 80-story One River Place condominiums, in Chicago’s historical Montgomery Ward Building.
Here's a close-up of the statue. It's a draped figure of a woman bearing a torch and balancing on a small globe called the 'Spirit of Progress,' atop the old Montgomery Ward building.
The 'Spirit of Progress' can easily be seen high on Chicago Avenue during the daylight hours. So our goal was for it have the retain the same beauty after the sun had set.
The unusual installation was complicated by the statue's precarious location. Because of this we also needed to provide a lighting solution that makes maintenance easy.
By using fiber spots, we eliminated the need to crawl out the window to perform the necessary maintenance associated with standard light bulbs.
The fiber is illuminated with a 250W Metal Halide bulb tucked safely inside the tower under the sculpture.
That said, we still had to do part of the installation outside the building. (So glad, this isn't me up there.)
Job almost done! We're coming back next week to add two traditional flood lights to illuminate the remainder of the statue.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by FiberopticStudio. FiberopticStudio said: We were thrilled this week to be given the opportunity to enhance a recognized piece of Chicago history & architecture. http://ht.ly/1FjfM [...]
[...] Co” (The History and Progress of Montgomery Ward and Company, p. 19). Four years later, the Spirit of Progress, a 17′ weathervane/statue, was set atop Ward’s Tower Building in downtown Chicago, making [...]