Sharmila Kumbhat, Director, K-Lite Industries, discusses the trends in landscaping lighting and the numerous options and solutions offered by the company to meet the design requirements of landscape and lighting designers

How has demand increased for landscape lighting?
The media and the digital spread have created an attitudinal change in the minds of the public. Gone are the days when people were content with a few trees and some plants in their houses and surroundings. Now, every independent house and gated community demands a green environment with state-of-the-art landscaping and outdoor lighting to enhance their environs. Hence, the demand for good landscape and lighting designers and a variety of application luminaires has increased manifold.

Today, due to the availability of more efficient lighting solutions, sustainable designs, global warming considerations, focus on aesthetics, safety concerns, and, above all, LED applications in lighting, the methods and equipment for outdoor illumination have undergone a total change.

New, innovative products and solutions for illumination have redefined outdoor and landscape lighting. With facade lights, RGB Led strips, DALI controls, controllable optics, and colour changing LEDs, landscape architects are now able to create innumerable creative lighting designs.

K-Lite: Beautifying Spaces, Sustainably

How are K-Lite products meeting this demand?
K-Lite has always been in the forefront of lighting solutions by regularly introducing new lighting concepts and luminaires, particularly in the outdoor lighting sphere. In fact, K-Lite became popular with its Bulk Head Fitting and a variety of Post Top Lanterns in the 1980’s, and then through its Bollards with MV/MH lamps, and subsequently CFL lamps. After the LED lamp came to the Indian market, we switched our product range to LEDs and introduced a variety of luminaires.

In order to meet the changing scenario and to meet the expectations of the architects and lighting designers, we also introduced a series of luminaires for facade and architectural lighting. For facade lighting of buildings, LED rope lighting with colour changing options and controls from K-Lite is a much sought-after item.

We offer a wide range of highly efficient and aesthetically designed Facade Luminaires, Pathway Luminaires, Pathfinders, Column Lights, Landscape Luminaires, Wall Washers, In-Ground Luminaires, Underwater Luminaires, Up-Down Lighters, Recess Mounted Down Lighters, area lighting poles, and street lighting with our sleek polar lighting solutions, along with various bracket fittings.
Sharmila Kumbhat, K-Lite Industries
The feasibility of total control over all the parameters in lighting, including colour changing, dimming, the concept of smart lighting with digital controls, and the Internet of Things (IoT), has enabled landscape architects and lighting designers to offer a variety of design options to beautify any environment, sustainably

Sharmila Kumbhat, K-Lite Industries

With our high-performance and aesthetic range of luminaires, lighting designers and architects can offer innumerable contemporary solutions for discreet illumination of outdoor spaces and make landscape designs dramatic with up-lighting, silhouetting, grazing lights, wall washing, and many other solutions. Our luminaires are enabling innovative designs using LEDs for lighting up retail outlets, offices, building facades, pathways, and for architectural lighting. K-Lite’s lighting range is all the more special because of the light source viz., energy saving, environment-friendly, long-lasting lamps.

Please name some of K-Lite’s prestigious lighting projects.
Our capability to manufacture and test the custom-built luminaires has brought our brand to the forefront of developmental activities and cater to the specially designed luminaire requirements of prestigious projects throughout the country. Our lighting projects include street lighting at Amritsar Golden Temple Complex, Varanasi City, Chandigarh-Mohali Highway etc. We have been catering to the Indian Railways’ luminaire requirements for their passenger Coach Building Unit and Integral Coach Factory, Rajdhani Express, Shatabdi Express, Palace on Wheel EMUs, Jaipur Metro, Delhi Metro, Bangalore Metro and the latest Kolkata-Metro and Sri Lankan Metro coaches. Today, K-lite has entered international markets, and its turnover has increased by more than 400 percent.

How do you see the lighting industry evolving in the coming years?
Globally, the lighting industry is growing at a very fast pace, with a projected value of around 2000 million USD. The coming decade is going to witness phenomenal changes in the field of lighting. During the last decade, the thrust was on energy saving solutions, which gave rise to the popularity of LED lighting, which began to replace conventional lighting. Application of solid-state devices as a source of lighting has given way to new concepts in lighting control and automation. In fact, automation in lighting is a major thrust area for lighting designers as well as manufacturers.

The order of the day is smart (green) concept in every field viz., smart homes, smart cities, smart lighting, smart poles etc. Smart lighting technology includes high efficiency fixtures and automated controls that make adjustments based on conditions such as occupancy, daylight, with an intelligent networked system of devices such as relays, occupancy sensors, photocells, light control switches, touchscreens, and signals from other building systems.

K-Lite: Beautifying Spaces, Sustainably

What does ‘light’ mean to you?
Light allows us to realize the possibilities of our imagination. The quality of light influences the quality of life and it is clear that light must combine techniques and emotions contemporaneously, defining new values, meanings, feelings, culture, comfort etc., while overcoming the simple light-dark dichotomy.