Alejandra Hernandez

What is your experience in lighting design and describe your philosophy towards it?

It's been 10 years since I specialized in lighting design as a profession and passion. I’ve worked hand-in-hand with some of the most important architectural firms, interior designers and property managers to develop projects from conceptual design to construction administration.

As a designer I have explored some of the most exciting landmarks of the profession, from interior design in México to historical building restoration in Italy.

I strongly believe aesthetics, sustainability and wellness are key concepts to be included in all of our successful projects.

One year ago, I founded — together with three amazing partners — a non-profit organization, Light without Borders Mexico and LATAM, as a branch of ‘Concepteurs Lumière Sans Frontières’. We work as a team to address social design and projects, following an integrative and inclusive methodology for people who can’t access these kinds of resources.

How do you integrate light and lighting in your projects?

I believe light is the perfect companion for every architectural, landscape or interior project. It highlights the architectural elements that need to be enhanced, brings night colors to amazing landscapes, and gives special character or personality to each interior space.

Each project has a very unique personality, including space, size, distribution, and characteristics of end users. That’s why every solution I design is always tailor made, considering technical and aesthetical aspects.

It's important for me to follow a design methodology and always get involved in entire design process. This procedure — with all the team involved in the project — leads to greater results, from conceptual design, construction documents and construction administration.

What are your three favorite projects?

All my projects are as interesting and significant as the first. As you can see from the examples pictured on my website, they are quite varied. Every time I start a project I feel as excited and dazzled as if it was my first project. And I cherish every design process because each one of them has its own personality and each client gives me the opportunity to experiment and create new ideas and solutions.

What's the role of connected lighting in tomorrow's urban planning? 
Sustainability goals are always achieved following national and international regulations as well as guidelines or best practices recommended by top notch certifications such as LEED (by the U.S. Green Building Council).

Some of these considerations are optimizing energy performance (sustainable lighting power densities), planning light levels according to the project and end users, minimizing or reducing light pollution, integrating energy management strategies, implementing a lighting control system and daylight harvesting.

Integrating wellness concepts in our projects has become more important than ever as we have to consider visual lighting design, circadian lighting design, glare control, solar glare control and daylight modeling.

We must learn to coexist in harmony with our surroundings.