Total Innovation Podcast
Welcome to "Total Innovation," the podcast where I explore all the different aspects of innovation, transformation and change. From the disruptive minds of startup founders to the strategic meeting rooms of global giants, I bring you the stories of change-makers. The podcast will engage with different voices, and peer into the multi-faceted world of innovation across and within large organisations.
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Total Innovation Podcast
26: Marco Miglioli - Lighting the Way
Marco is an award-winning lighting architect whose work spans cathedrals, museums, theatres—and now, refugee camps.
He was the winning solver in the International Rescue Committee’s “Phosphorescence Technology for Lighting” challenge—a challenge we heard so movingly about in our conversation with Carla Lopez from the International Rescue Committee in an earlier episode in this season of the podcast.
This episode is all about light: not just the technical or aesthetic side, but light as dignity, safety, and human innovation.
Welcome back everyone to the Total Innovation podcast. As always, I'm your host, Simon Hill. Today, we have a bonus episode that will go out to close out the humanitarian crowd solving series that I started earlier in this in this season with a very special guest, Marco Miglioli. I met Marco recently at a Wozoku event in Milan, and like so many of the brilliant minds in our Innocentive crowd, I was immediately struck by his passion, precision, and perspective. Marco is an award winning lighting architect whose work spans cathedrals, museums, theaters, and as you'll hear on today's episode, now refugee camps. He was the winning solver in the International Rescue Committee's Phosphorescence Technology for Lighting Challenge. It's a bit of a mouthful. A challenge we heard so movingly about in our conversation with Carla Lopez from the IRC in an earlier episode of this season of the podcast. I recommend everyone to go back and listen to that if you haven't done already. In this episode, which is all about light, not just the technical or aesthetic aspects of light, but light as dignity, light as safety, and light as human innovation. In this fascinating topic, we're going to get into it with Marco, who knows more about light than probably many people out there. And so with that, Marco, to shed some light on lights, welcome to the podcast. It's great to meet you. Thank you. Welcome. Good. Very welcome. Very welcome. And everyone listening English is not Marco's first language, but he's great at it. And we will try and make sure that everything is as you know, as clear and clear as understandable as we possibly can. And thank you, Marco, for giving me your time. So let's get into it, Marco. You know, I said we met in Italy. I was struck by your passion and your enthusiasm for the work that you do. And you describe yourself as a lighting architect, a phrase that maybe it's your Italian as well, it feels quite poetic. So maybe just talk a little bit about what that means to you. What is a lighting architect? Yeah, actually, well, thank you. Well, lighting architect is as an analogism, used to describe my work because but in Italian we don't really have a word or proper translations for lighting designer, so we use different terms and so I started using this term, this phrase lighting architect because it's this expression, it's it summarizes my approach to light. I studied architecture, I'm an architect although I've been actually I've been working almost exclusively lighting design and especially on architectural lighting for about fifteen years now. And so in a way these terms seems to me to let's say to sum up my path. Architecture is a big space, we in that base we live in and we can see it thanks to the light, to the way we use the light to the way we lit the architecture. So this is the definition of this new term, I would say this lighting architect, which is actually in another translation from the term I use in Italian. What is this? What is the term you use in Italian? It's architecto del delugi, which means architect of lights. Okay. And this term speaks of a light that's that it's a part, it's integral part of architecture. It's architecture itself but also suggests an fusion and mixture between my two profession, which is the architect and lighting designer mostly. Yeah, think it's, one of the things I love about the podcast and the job that I get to do in working across innovation is you realize not just the breadth, but also the depth of the complex system that we live in, right? And the fact that, you know, light is so fundamental to so many aspects of what we do. And yet, you know, I hadn't given it anywhere near as much thought clearly as you have done. But even just in preparation for this, this podcast, I it forced me to think a little bit more around around lights. I moved last year to Sweden and, you know, is a little bit more sparse there in parts of the year and a little bit more prominent there in parts of the year than even the UK. And so you think about lights in different ways. In looking at your background, you studied under Peter Zumthor and Mario Botta, who I think are two giants of architecture, right? How did those early experiences shape your view of light and space and bring you the expertise and the career that you've built around light? Well actually having professors from different parts of the world, it's helped me to see the light, to see architecture in a different way. You mentioned now, light in Sweden or light in Greece or light in South Africa, it's not the same. Were different sky with different luminosity with a different set. I think in my university having such different, so many different architecture helped me to see things in architecture in a different way. Studying architecture, having professors like Peter Zunto, Maribotta or the chance to exchange ideas with people like Kenneth Framto or Frank Gehry just name someone helped me to let's say to develop a sense of a space and taught me to how to translate emotion into concrete, into tangible places and because I think that just as a big space architecture can transmit emotion light too when it interacts when it is combined with architecture as to evoke sensation as to transmit feelings so let's play constant let's plays with men and creates emotional situations and then I have to say that my university reminds me a kind of a little of the Bow Wow school, know the old Bow Wow school that we had much more, many more courses, many more subjects than typical the current technical university. So we had for example exams in painting or c life or like set design and contemporary art photography. And the model making laboratory were the really heart of the school so that there's all of these neurologists experience with those professors and the way the university was set lets me to with the idea that the architecture is not still but it's kind of living being, know, it's something that transform and light and in the same way in my opinion should be able to change, to move over the time and so especially through the interplay between light and shadow so that yeah, that's like, and I still remember actually when one of the recurring exam we with Zoomtor, which was called Literary Atmosphere we used to do it a lot of time which was about giving a transform that sensation into a form and so like studying, I think studying architecture and even art or in that university rather than taking a course or master in lighting design just a course in lighting design that really shaped my point of view, view, my way I work and it took me to see lighting not just a simple way, simple tool to illuminate things and to show things but as a means to communicate, to convey, to transmit emotions. Yeah, I think I'm always slightly, slightly I think maybe jealous is a good word, but envious maybe is another one of people that really built this kind of deep specialism from you know, from the practical, theoretical learning of university into a career. You know, some people have these quite neatly mapped out pathways. And I think this broader sense of it, as you said, you could have gone and studied just lighting, but lighting is part of a system. It's part of a creative process, part of an emotive process and part of an innovation process as we'll get on to later. I'm going to pull back a little bit on that on that statement you said earlier as well, which is about deciding what to bring into light and what to leave in shadow. And maybe you can give us some examples of how that's played out in your studio work and your project work and why you think that's so important. Yeah, sure. Well, because every time I do a project I have to decide what to do and what to show. So whenever I approach a project I always try to create a hierarchy, level within a space to guide the eye, to draw attention to certain elements and so choosing what's within a building or a public space plays the most important role in the history I want to tell you and so I had to do and I had to do this through the relationship to the connection between light and shadow. So the relationship, this relationship is what defines the narrative part of architecture and so a clear example could be for example the religious buildings. I'm thinking of the Milan cathedral or a basilica in central Italy was lighting I worked on and in those spaces light accents or shattered plays help guide the visitor through to the different moments of religious services and it's the life changes over time and that it shows something that's it's important in that moment of the religion and then while I speak of speaking about shadow as a visual language in itself, mainly shadow, another project came to mind which is a major exhibition on romanticism, my elite some years ago and this exhibition was an exhibition where I can say light, arts and music came together to create a sensual experience. Romanticism places, sets the individual, the man, the human at the center. So it's all that contradiction and existential apprehension and longing for freedom. So in the Romantic era, the Romantic character is a tormented figure now. It's often a young man who rejects society rules and oppose them and often meets tragic ends like old Romantic figures. And one of the sculpture in the exhibition, which is explained well, way I work, was called Bald Reggietto, which is a statue about an orphan boy who fought in defense of the Roman Republic and was killed by a bomb and exploded in his hands. So I want to and I like to focus on the lighting of the statue because as I said it reflects my both my interpretation of the exhibition but my way I work, so that the way I work because and the statue was placed in a dark room and was lit by strong light as if the explosion of the bomb were breaking let's say the darkness and in the same way casting it's a deep or distorted unsettling shadow across the back wall and so now what would the visitor have seen if the statue had been lit, had been illuminated with evenly, with diffuse lights, but they would have seen a boy with a small dog and his feet and carved with really smooth luminous marble and so kind of rhetorical and unblemished little Leonovese as classical arts often show us as romanticism, the idea we have of romanticism and but I instead wanted to present something dramatically more real and that was possible just through the use of shadows. The exhibition in fact unfolded through corridors and rooms that alternated between lights and darkness. It wasn't just about seeing the artworks but it was about entering, it was about getting into the spirit of that period and the exhibition showed us merge these two solo romantic scenes, the one which we are using about mythological murals and the one of the monster, creature that emerged from them and they were shattered like if they were the shadow of I'd say Frankistan or Dracula were actually quite fictional characters but born not by chance but from the imagination of brighter from of the periods and so the cast shadows becomes in this way works themselves, distorted terrifying magazines of the darker soul which is conceived within the statue. So that's why I wanted to tune in just to leave something in the darkness to let people imagine or to let people dream about something also not to show everything. I feel like you and I need to go spend some time together in some places of worship and some museums and you can help me see the world in a totally different way than perhaps I have been seeing it. But I do think it raises so many questions, right? And I was thinking as you were talking there about, you know, the different aspects of this from an innovation angle, which we, as I said, we'll get onto this, you know, like kind of why we're talking about lighting in an innovation podcast in a little while. But there really are huge amounts of parallels, right? Like the innovation relies heavily on storytelling. It relies on, you know, what is said and what isn't said can be super impactful. You know, what we show and what we don't show is analogous to that in terms of light and dark and shadow and what you leave to the imagination versus what you and how you present these things really does lead to the way that people receive it. But those people also have to be attuned to that, right? I think if I spent time in your company in one of your museums, you might get deeply frustrated with me because my mind works in a different way. You're like, but can't you see the beauty in this thing, Simon? And there's an element of storytelling that needs to come out in some of these things. Your research and your work has, you know, it touches as you've just spoken to, on perception, on aging, on visual well-being, on a number of different quite emotive and I guess quite deeply spiritual things. And we'll call them human centered, right? So why does this human centered aspect of your work so important to you? Well, it's important because people are always at the center of the projects and they that people are completely different as many people can see things in a different way. If we go to the museum together, maybe you can teach me something that I don't see. Maybe. Everyone has different perspectives. I think that just architecture is built around the human being and it's different things, is different way that the human see reality, the light in the same way that the light that reveals the show the architecture should also be a thought for people and and that because lighting with its color, its intensity, it's deeply connected to how we perceive the space and that's why pushed me to let's say to explore, to research solution that allow everyone to better perceive the reality, the space around you. Actually I started my researches, my study about well-being or aging and how visual perception changes over time. When I realized when I was studying lightning, I realized that most of the lighting standard, most of the lighting rules and researches are based on groups of people between twenty and thirty but vision obviously and the way the eye respond to light changes significantly with the time with the age. So the way a one year old child sees things it's completely different from how a twenty years old or another people see things. That's why my work it's about lighting it's it's not just it's just lighting, just studying lighting but as to look many other subjects like physiology or biology so and that's why I believe we need to we need a more inclusive and global approach to design and the same it's not just for lighting but the same goes for architecture itself. So we as architects or as people in general we should think more about architectural barriers and how to overcome them rather than focusing on only on abstract forms and abstract architecture and all these solutions obviously should also be integrated and put inside in a beautiful architecture. So yes, I think we should build beautiful spaces because I think beauty and art is naturally contributes to people's well-being and because there are human needs, requirements and so we shouldn't be building as we say in a cathedral in the desert or just building to just to do it, that's focused only on aesthetic but we need to put people's well-being at the center. And that includes also the well-being of other animals or other living beings. Animals that for example who are often affected by light pollutions now and also plants or the natural environment in general. But unfortunately there are still fewer research on these. Yeah, that moves us nicely actually into the and I think we've sort of touched on it as we've gone that that light isn't just about light. It's also about the absence of light, right? And so one of the things that I've seen you advocate for is for darker skies, and as you've just mentioned, environmental balance. And so how do you see your role as a designer and a light advocate in the global conversation around sustainability and well-being? Well, I I enrolled the Duckshead Association because well actually the environment is really fundamental especially nowadays the way we treat the environment into the nature and I think the role of a designer, lighting designer or designer in general in this sense is absolutely crucial because it prevents poor lighting or poor architecture and environmental context and sustainability concern among all especially the outdoor light and the outdoor and outdoor lighting effort from me and as I was saying before like a designer has the responsibility, I said to use expertise to use the right technique to direct the light to focus the light only where it's truly needed and to avoid wasting it because waste lights, it can be harmful to the environment and it can disturb animals, affect plants and but also means wasting of energy. And it's not just about money either, energy, but also about consuming valuable resources. So once again, need to think on a more global scale. So when we design, especially about human being, tend to isolate the human and we just build or design thinking only about human but human are a part of wider ecosystem. An ecosystem that we have to respect, have to care of and to care about with which we have to coexist, you know, so and at least you know about that sky that you asked me before I say yes it's wonderful to be illuminated but it's also beautiful not to be over illuminated because it's to the point where we can see the sky, we can't see the sky in our city. And I think it's beautiful for a person to during the night and going to see it, to see the water light up with bioluminescence or to look up to fill the gaze up to the stars and to fantasize, to dream about the night with the stars. It's no, that's Yeah, thank Yeah, no, no. Go on. I was just gonna say thank you. And I was gonna sort of, because I'm gonna move us slightly now into the topic of innovation, more specifically that led you and I to agreeing to do this episode. But I'm hoping everybody listening can understand why, even though the next part of the podcast is digging into the specific innovation story, why I actually was really passionate about telling this first part and making it most of the podcast, because it's an area that, as you said, it touches, it's multidisciplinary, right? Your background is multidisciplinary, but as with all of these fascinating areas of highly skilled expertise, lighting isn't just about lighting, right? And it isn't just about light either. And it is about innovation. And it is about experience. And it is about, you know, where value can be created, perceived, received in all its myriad forms as well. And so that's the background piece, right? And that's who Marco is. And I'm sure people get a sense of your passion. And also, you know, the beauty of you as a person around all of this as well, right? It comes across an abundance. You and I met as a consequence of an innovation challenge. Right? And this is where, in this instance, it was about lighting as a mechanism for safety, for protection. Right? So we ran this challenge that I mentioned in the introduction for the IRC, the International Rescue Committee. Can you just describe a little bit about the challenge and how you came to be participating in this as well? Sure. But as you said, I mean, lighting is not just light, it's about something more can be used. So even in this challenge lighting it's not just lighting but it's to provide something more to people who live in the refugees camp So and this challenge which Carlo Lopez also mentioned in one of the recent podcast episodes and was to design a lamp that could light latrines in refugee camps and these latrines for hygiene reasons are usually located far from contained from shelters. So the task was to come up with an innovative autonomous lighting solution, something that didn't rely on electricity, there's no batteries, no solar panel and cost under five dollars could provide a life for at least twelve hours and enough lights to read the sheet of paper and their recharging time had to be no more than eight hour and the lamp should last for five years and in addition it had to, with sense harsh weather it had to be easy to install and safe from theft, damage. The beginning it seems to me like an almost impossible challenge as I was used to do before and it was something that can I was just to to build everything and with almost without any restrictions? Yeah, it's a literal moon on a stick challenge. That's what they were looking for in this case. Wanted the moon on a stick with the lights. Exactly. As a lighting Try it. It was a good exercise I think to face this, to do this challenge with so strict rules and because to to face this challenge, to solve this challenge, I changed my approach to the design because I tried to, let's say, to put myself in the shoes of people who have to manage, to live in this extreme situation and in refugee camps electricity is often completely absent. And so going to the latrines into the bathroom during the night, for women and children means exposing to serious risks, which can be attacks from other people or even encounter with dangerous animals, dangerous wildlife, even the darkness, like scape, snakes or so. So lighting those letterings became a real urgency and so what pushed me to say yes I want to try, I want to find a solution to this problem was the ethical and social dimension of the challenge. Say the chance not to work on, chance to work on a new sustainable affordable lighting that be used by people and could have a real use and not just theoretical. So the idea of, let's say, light exactly where it's most needed and that was inspiring. And since developing a solution for this challenge requires a lot of time, a lot of energy. I also saw this challenge, this moment as a personal moment of research and growth, right? That's why that is a reason why I keep developing this project and improving the prototype even now that the challenge is finished, I'm still working on and to, if I can improve this solution and bring more light or more and to more time then and to keep lighting for more time and so I like to explore and continue working on this topic and especially on photorescent light because it's, I see that it's still an unexplored field and it's a light source that doesn't need electricity and it's ecological and recyclable. So if we think about the current situation, which is becoming unsustainable, let's say nowadays, right now fossil fuels are being questioned, So it's so crucial I think to find to study new alternatives that responds to the changing climate. And in this way I think that maybe challenge and innovation are useful for NetApproach, this kind of thing that we can try to find a solution and to see things in a different way. I think that global challenges are quite useful even for not to find a solution to improve the life. It's amazing. And I think that that mix of real impact, and we're going to talk a little bit more about that in a second, plus the environmental piece, plus the fact that it's really ignited a spark in you in a slightly different area of lighting, they're part of that mix of why you get involved in these kinds of things, right? Because, you know, to remind people listening, this is a voluntary act by you. You weren't guaranteed of any impact, of any financial reward. You did work on your own time on something that you thought would be interesting. And maybe just on that, you know, you've written, you've you've worked on projects for for rural palaces, for museums, for these famous art galleries and cathedrals we've spoken about. What was it about applying your craft and your knowledge into humanitarian context, especially ones involving such vulnerability and need that, like what did you learn from this? What did it take you? Yeah, so the difference, seeing different topics and analysis over and humanitarian fees and the funds are different and their resources are different and never, I mean, the connectivity to what I was saying before, one of the I choose to try this challenge, as you said, even before for the ethical, you know, things not just before, not the prize or whatever because it was not sure. And then to the challenge and the research in itself. And I would say that in a certain way the research is what's connected, maybe the way I approach a museum or palaces, royal palaces and the humanitarian field, humanitarian context. Because working on important artworks which are pieces that require a special lighting, a special solution and careful study to avoid damage or long term degradation caused by light has definitely changed my way I think, my way I work because it made me realize that the light doesn't just illuminate, doesn't just create a space but it can also destroy. And in a similar way when I, when working in humanitarian context, light must be used with the same care manager just as we use specific lighting to preserve artworks, to keep artworks so they can be appreciated by future generations. The same respect should be, let's say extended even more so to the people and especially to the people who lives in difficult humanitarian conditions and who deserve a minimum, at least a minimum level of well-being. If artwork needs protection and attention and care then people need even more. In addition, I think light should protect beauty and make it visible, make this beauty visible. So even in refugee camps, whether it's an architectural project or medical facilities or lighting system like the one I made, electric lamp, like the one in the challenge, which should try to make those spaces more beautiful, refugee camp more beautiful because I think that welcoming pleasant space can help fights feelings of anger and resignation or sadness. Course it's not the only thing that matters but creates, but creating it safer and more comfortable environments then definitely makes a difference. Then again, I think during a challenge on humanitarian fields means also to use study and research in the same way I study for arts because I study a lot and they try to make, cannot make any mistake. Choose it maybe a wrong light, it can destroy or fade the color of painting and about humanitarian sector, humanitarian fields, if now what resources are most of the time in field are and they're not frequent so just wasting resources and with an idea that maybe cannot be beat or cannot be useful, it cannot work, it means wasting resources that cannot be otherwise implemented for other things. In this way I know it's personal feeling like what was like I felt like depression and doing this challenge because I knew that I couldn't fail and So many people talk about that deep level of connection and this real feeling of accountability and responsibility for the projects that you undertake on a completely voluntary basis. Right? And I think it's just, it's just incredible. Larmarco, there's so many more places we could go with this, but I'm conscious conscious of time. And so I'm gonna start to to wrap us wrap us up a little bit. I I want to thank you for fear of a bad pun. This has been a truly illuminating episode. And I think it's been it's, you know, there's so much more depth to the topic of light, as I've said multiple times through this than I'd ever thought about. I want to congratulate you personally on being successful in this challenge. Know, I think it's very, it could have been one that, you know, you totally overlooked. I had no idea we such a, you know, such a deep level of knowledge around specific lighting in there. But it really wasn't just your lighting background. It was the holistic background you come from that brought you the ability to think about this, to apply your research mindset to it. And as Carla spoke about in her episode, this will go far beyond just the topic that we were talking about in terms of the latrines, because this is a highly scalable solution, right? We're now working on trying to bring this to market. And I think it'll impact hundreds of millions of lives over over time. And so thank you and congratulations on that. I don't know if there's any final thoughts you'd like to have and then I'm going to wrap us up. Well, maybe like a message I would like to share and which is connected to the challenge of the phosphorescence lighting and which is something that I learned by working on humanitarian challenges is that often it takes very little to solve a problem and it takes just small lights to change the place. And we don't need like complex technologies or high technology solution and tech solution which mainly calls to naming ends. But since the light for this this challenge was created using phosphorescent material, I think there's also a second message I want to share that is we need to explore, we need to experiment new form of sustainable low cost lighting that can be applied in real life and not just in theory, especially in moments like this when humanitarian needs are constantly growing and resources are becoming more and more limited. Those are these two There's a big call out to all the organizations out there that might be interested in this to say, look, there's a willing mind here. And for people that are interested in Marco's work, we'll share some links to his profile and other things in the show notes afterwards. Marco, thank you very much for today's episode. Thank you. Yep. Thank you everyone for listening. Marco's work reminds us that innovation doesn't always have to come from high-tech or high budget solutions. It can come from attention, intention, and a willingness to see things differently. As we wrap up this three part arc on humanitarian crowd solving, with huge thanks to Harry Sangri, Carla Lopez, and now, of course, today's guest, Marco, I'm reminded once again of the immense power of the global community to innovate for good. And whilst this wraps up the humanitarian spotlight, we've got one more episode before a well earned summer break for me and the podcast. So join me next time for a conversation with Ludwig Bergstrom, the founder of Nordic Tech Week. He's a brilliant voice at the intersection of innovation, sustainability, and regional dynamism. Until then, stay curious, stay kind, and keep innovating.
