Böli

Spring 2023

Böli is a cast concrete bollard made to illuminate dark city streets. This K-rated outdoor lighting fixture acts as a security measure in densely populated cities, while appearing more whimsical and beautiful than typical urban barricades.

Preliminary sketches for Böli explored a variety of different shapes and themes for illuminated bollards. The sketches are all for concepts that are cast in concrete, and act as both lighting fixtures and protective barriers in cities.

Ideation & Sketching

Some bollard ideas were more New York Centric, such as the ones above, modeled after famous NYC landmarks.

Design Goals: Find a good balance in form between the heaviness of concrete and the lightness of illumination devices.

After a general aesthetic had been picked, sketches continued digitally so that approximate weights and volumes could be more easily calculated.

Digital Sketching

Design Goals: Create a structurally sound, yet beautiful light source to make the standard bollard less brutalist.

Formwork for Böli was CNC cut out of pink foam, and then glued together for casting. Despite covering the formwork with form release, removing the foam after curing was still a labourius task,

Production

Design Goals: Test the feasibility of the formwork design and experience the prototype in 1:1 scale.

A set of technical drawings was completed for Böli so that the design, complete with specified manufactured parts and lighting so that Böli could be manufactured.