deLIGHTed talks Asia @ GILE 2026
Good Light Wake-up Call Series Report 11
Martin Klaasen / VLDC: Future Forum Debrief — Trends, Opportunities and Recommendations for Life Centric Lighting
In the previous reports of the Good Light Wake-up Call series, we explored healthy lighting from many angles.
Professor Robert Lucas reminded us that traditional lux is not enough to describe how light tells the body time.
Dr. Marijke Gordijn emphasized that Good Light means the right light at the right time.
Jan Denneman called on the industry to move from illumination to human outcomes.
Kei Haraguchi of Nichia showed how white LED technology, after 30 years, must move beyond LPW and toward new human value.
Dr. Anne Berends of SunLED Life Science expanded the discussion beyond visible light, toward near-infrared light, dose and scientific boundaries.
Jeff Miller reminded us that designers translate science into human experience.
Kevan Shaw emphasized that healthy lighting must be designed, calculated, measured, verified and operated.
The owner value article asked how healthy lighting can move from wellness story to verified asset value.
Amardeep Dugar introduced a salutogenic framework, reminding us that Good Light should make spaces more comprehensible, manageable and meaningful.
Martin Klaasen and VLDC bring another essential perspective: If we know healthy lighting matters, how can the industry act together?
This is not only a technical question. It is not only a product question. It is not a question that can be solved by one country, one company, one standard or one profession alone.
Life Centric Lighting faces a more complex future.
AI is changing design workflows. Digital tools are reshaping how professionals work. Mood, emotion, wellbeing and human experience are becoming central parts of spatial value.
Asia has enormous manufacturing capability, project scale and implementation speed. International designers bring experience, methodology and critical reflection. Manufacturers, control providers, architects, owners, researchers and operators must now sit at the same table.
The real value of the Future Forum is therefore not simply another conference session.
It asks a deeper question: How can healthy lighting and Life Centric Lighting move from ideas on stage to ideas in action?
1 | From Frankfurt to Guangzhou: from presentation-led forums to action-led dialogue
One phrase captures the spirit of this transition: From ideas on stage to ideas in action.
This is also a strong way to describe the next mission of deLIGHTed talks Asia @ GILE 2026.
For many years, the healthy lighting industry needed forums. It needed scientific voices. It needed standards discussions. It needed to understand what CIE, IES, IWBI, IALD, GLG and other international organizations were working on. It needed to understand how LED technology, controls, design, owners and public buildings connect.
But once awareness begins to grow, the industry cannot remain in listening mode forever.
The next step must involve: Dialogue. Debate. Co-creation. Workshops. Scenario definition. Clarification of user needs. Action roadmaps. Demonstration projects. Follow-up collaboration.
This is where Guangzhou can become meaningful as an Asia Edition.
Frankfurt may serve as an international stage for trends. Guangzhou should become a field of action for Asia.
Here, the industry should not only ask: What are the future trends?
It must also ask:
- How do these trends land in Asia?
- How should designers respond?
- How should manufacturers transform?
- How should control systems integrate?
- How can owners understand value?
- How can Chinese and Asian supply chains move from cost advantage to system capability?
- How can international design experience meet local project reality?
- Can we define a practical next step?
This is the shared spirit of Future Forum and Good Light Wake-up Call.
Not only to talk about the future. But to turn the future into action.
2 | Why Life Centric Lighting?
For many years, the industry has used the term Human Centric Lighting, or HCL.
The term was useful. It helped the industry move from product-centered thinking toward people. It shifted attention from technical performance to user experience. It expanded the conversation from energy efficiency to health, comfort and wellbeing.
But the term has also become problematic.
It is easily reduced to a label. It can become marketing language. It can become cool-to-warm tuning. It can become “eye-care,” “full spectrum” or “healthy mode.” It can even become an unsupported health claim.
This is why several speakers in the Good Light Wake-up Call series have urged caution around simplified HCL language.
Life Centric Lighting may offer a broader future perspective. It does not only place the individual human at the centre. It places people back into the larger systems of life: Time. Space. Nature. Technology. Society. Behaviour. Emotion. Community. Ecology. Operation.
A person’s light exposure does not happen only in the office. It happens at home, in hotels, schools, hospitals, streets, transit spaces, shopping environments, digital screens, night-time cities and personal devices.
A building’s light environment does not only support visual tasks. It also shapes behaviour, emotion, social interaction, brand, operation, energy use, data and urban experience.
A city’s lighting is not only about night-time beauty. It also concerns ecology, dark skies, public safety, night-time economy, residents’ sleep and public health.
Life Centric Lighting is therefore not simply a new slogan. It asks the industry to understand light as part of a living system.
From lighting for tasks to lighting for life.
3 | AI and digital tools: the workflow of lighting design is being reshaped
One key theme of the Future Forum is: AI, digital tools and the future workflow.
This is critical for lighting.
Once healthy lighting and Life Centric Lighting become real, project complexity increases dramatically.
Designers can no longer consider only horizontal illuminance. They also need to consider eye-level exposure, spectrum, m-EDI, DER, flicker, daylight variation, control scenes, surface reflectance, user behaviour and operational data.
If all of this depends only on manual processing, healthy lighting will be difficult to scale.
The value of AI and digital tools is not to replace designers. It is to help designers work with more complexity.
For example, AI and digital tools may help: Analyze spatial light environments more quickly. Simulate light exposure at different times of day. Translate product spectral data into design language. Estimate eye-level stimulation under different scenarios. Generate control strategies. Compare visual, biological and emotional impacts of different options. Help owners understand investment value. Connect design, construction, commissioning and operation data. Optimize scenes after real measurements.
But AI also carries risk.
- If scientific boundaries are unclear, AI can amplify error.
- If training data are unreliable, AI can produce confident but misleading recommendations.
- If designers rely too heavily on automation, spatial experience may become formulaic.
- If manufacturers use AI only as a marketing feature, healthy lighting may become another concept bubble.
Therefore, AI should not be treated as a magical answer. It should be an augmentation tool for designers, engineers and operators.
AI can help us see possibilities faster. But it cannot replace scientific judgment. It cannot replace design responsibility. It cannot replace field verification. It cannot replace human experience.
4 | Future workflow: from linear design to data loops
Traditional lighting projects often follow a linear workflow: Concept design. Detailed design. Specification. Construction. Commissioning. Handover.
After handover, designers often leave the project. The lighting enters operation. Actual user experience and long-term performance are rarely tracked.
Healthy lighting and Life Centric Lighting require a different workflow.
They are not finished at installation.
They involve:
- Design goals.
- Product data.
- Software calculation.
- Control logic.
- Field measurement.
- User feedback.
- Operational adjustment.
- Long-term optimization.
Future lighting workflows must move from linear delivery to feedback loops.
- Before design, user groups and scenarios must be defined.
- During design, visual and non-visual metrics must be calculated.
- During specification, HCL-ready data must be available.
- During construction, installation and control logic must be preserved.
- During commissioning, field measurements must be carried out.
- During handover, verification reports must be provided.
- During operation, scenes must be monitored and adjusted.
- During post-occupancy evaluation, learning must feed into the next project.
This is the transition: From design intent to verified operation.
In this workflow, digital tools, AI, sensors, BMS, lighting control systems and field measurement devices may become essential infrastructure.
Future healthy lighting projects cannot only be well designed. They must also run correctly.
5 | Mood, emotion and wellbeing: healthy lighting cannot be reduced to physiology
Another important theme of the Future Forum is: Mood, emotion, wellbeing and human experience.
This matters because healthy lighting can easily become too technical. m-EDI. DER. CCT. Duv. SPD. Pst LM. SVM. Lux. Controls. Sensors. AI.
All of these are important.
But when real people enter a space, they do not first experience metrics.
They feel:
- Does this place make me relaxed?
- Does it make me alert?
- Does it make me feel safe or uneasy?
- Do I want to stay here?
- Do I want to talk with others?
- Does the space feel caring?
- Does it have rhythm, hierarchy and meaning?
Emotion is not a decorative extra in healthy lighting. It is central to spatial experience.
- An office may meet many technical criteria and still feel cold.
- A hotel room may have a sleep mode and still feel unnatural.
- A hospital ward may have circadian lighting and still make patients anxious.
- A public space may be bright enough and still fail to invite people to stay.
Life Centric Lighting must connect scientific metrics with emotional experience.
Healthy lighting should not turn spaces into laboratories.
It should make spaces more suitable for life. More comfortable. More rhythmic. More emotionally intelligent. More humane. More supportive of transitions between human states.
6 | The role of designers: from aesthetics to experience choreography
In Life Centric Lighting, the role of designers changes.
Lighting designers have traditionally been seen as professionals who: Create visual atmosphere. Shape architectural expression. Solve illuminance and glare. Make buildings and spaces beautiful.
All of these remain important.
But future designers must also become choreographers of experience. They must work not only with where light comes from.
They must also work with: Time of day. Human behaviour. Emotional states. Daylight and electric light. Visual and non-visual needs. Digital control and user freedom. Spatial narrative and health goals.
The balance between measurable metrics and non-measurable feeling.
This requires a broader professional capability. Designers must understand aesthetics, but also scientific boundaries. They must understand space, but also data. They must understand human feeling, but also controls. They must understand global trends, but also local reality.
This does not weaken the designer. It gives the designer a stronger role in the value chain.
Because in the healthy lighting era, value is not created by a product alone. It is created by how designers orchestrate products, technology, science, scenarios and people into a coherent experience.
7 | Why East-West design dialogue matters
In the Future Forum Asia Edition concept, one interesting proposal is the idea of paired tandems: One international designer. One Chinese or Asian designer. Working together to moderate, question, edit and present outcomes.
This is not internationalization for appearance. It has practical value.
Future lighting problems cannot be solved from a single perspective.
International designers may bring global project experience, methodology, trend awareness and cross-cultural reflection.
Chinese and Asian designers understand local owners, project timelines, supply chains, construction realities, budget pressures and user habits.
International perspectives can help avoid local industry over-competition and short-termism. Local perspectives can prevent global ideas from becoming detached from reality.
One side brings broader direction. The other brings local application.
One brings conceptual intelligence. The other brings practical intelligence.
This is exactly the kind of dialogue the Asian healthy lighting ecosystem needs.
Asia should not simply receive international trends. Asia should be the place where international trends are tested, translated and implemented.
8 | Manufacturers should not only be sponsors. They should be co-creators.
In many industry forums, manufacturers are often placed in a limited role: Sponsor the event. Show products. Promote the brand. Present technical advantages. Introduce new solutions.
These are useful.
But in the co-creation logic of the Future Forum, manufacturers should not only be sponsors. They should be co-creators.
Because the future of Life Centric Lighting depends on manufacturing capability. Designers may define needs. Scientists may define metrics. Owners may define value. Controls may define operation logic.
But many of these ideas must eventually enter products: Light sources. Spectra. Luminaires. Drivers. Control interfaces. Dimming quality. Data formats. Sensors. System integration. Maintenance models. Cost structures.
If manufacturers only hear the conclusion, transformation will be slow. If manufacturers enter the co-creation process, they can understand earlier: What data designers truly need. What value owners are willing to pay for. What interfaces control systems require. How healthy lighting products can avoid overclaiming. How future products can move from hardware specifications to scenario capability. How the industry can move from single-product competition to system value.
This is especially important for Asian and Chinese lighting manufacturing.
In the past, strengths have included speed, scale, cost and supply chain completeness.
In the future, entering the higher-value zone of healthy lighting and Life Centric Lighting will require a shift: From responding to orders to defining problems.
Not only making products. But helping define the next generation of light environments.
9 | Controls and digital systems: from technical accessories to experience infrastructure
Healthy lighting cannot become time-based without controls.
Life Centric Lighting cannot become personalized, responsive and optimized without digital systems.
Therefore, controls, sensors, AI, software and building platforms are no longer technical accessories. They are becoming experience infrastructure.
They may help:
- Adjust electric light according to daylight.
- Tune intensity and spectrum across time.
- Change scenes according to space use.
- Provide user choice.
- Optimize design based on eye-level measurement.
- Detect system failure through operation data.
- Refine scenes after user feedback.
But digitalization must serve people.
It should not make control systems more confusing. It should not force users to face more buttons. It should not add excessive operational burden to owners. It should not turn spaces into technology showrooms.
A truly good digital light environment should allow complex systems to work in the background while the front-end experience becomes simple.
Users should feel natural. Operators should manage easily. Designers should optimize continuously. Owners should see value. Healthy lighting should become sustainable in real operation.
10 | Asia’s opportunity: not following trends, but defining implementation
The significance of Future Forum Asia Edition is not to copy a European forum into Guangzhou.
Its deeper question is: What should Asia do?
Asia has a unique position in the lighting industry. It has one of the strongest manufacturing ecosystems in the world. It has fast-changing urban and building markets. It has large numbers of hospitality, office, residential, healthcare, education and public building projects. It has strong smart hardware and digital platform capability. It also has intense price competition, product homogeneity and delivery pressure.
This means Asia faces both challenges and opportunities.
The challenges are clear:
The industry can fall into low-price competition. Healthy lighting can become another marketing concept. Design value can be compressed. Controls can become gimmicks. Owners may demand quick and visible returns. High-level concepts may be reduced to low-cost delivery.
But the opportunities are equally strong:
Asia can turn healthy lighting into real scenarios. It can build demonstration projects quickly. It can connect manufacturing, design, controls and owners. It can promote HCL-ready data implementation. It can develop strong engineering delivery capacity. It can combine international science with local practice. It can help Life Centric Lighting move from concept to scalable application.
Asia should not only follow trends. Asia should define implementation.
11 | From trend insight to action recommendations
The real value of a Future Forum is not to summarize trends. It is to translate trends into action.
For designers: Learn new science, but do not lose spatial sensitivity and aesthetic judgment. Use AI and digital tools, but do not abandon human experience. Collaborate earlier with manufacturers, controls and owners.
For manufacturers: Do not compete only on cheaper products. Provide HCL-ready data. Understand scenario value. Move from selling luminaires to supporting system solutions. Avoid exaggerated health claims.
For control system providers: Do not create scenes only for demonstration. Make healthy lighting operate according to time. Support measurement, feedback and maintenance. Turn complex technology into simple experience.
For owners: Do not buy only a wellness story. Define goals, verify results and assess long-term value. Make healthy lighting part of operation, not only handover.
For industry platforms: Do not only organize events. Capture consensus. Build issue maps. Support demonstration projects. Create cross-disciplinary collaboration mechanisms. Keep science, design, technology, manufacturing and owner value in continuous dialogue.
This is what it means to move: From ideas on stage to ideas in action.
12 | The next step of Good Light Wake-up Call: co-creation, not one-way communication
The first step of Good Light Wake-up Call is awakening. The industry must recognize that light is not only illumination. Light affects rhythms, emotions, behaviour, experience, operation and public value.
The second step is shared language. m-EDI. DER. Integrative Lighting. Salutogenic Framework. Owner Value. HCL-ready Data. Verification. Operation.
The third step is co-creation. This is the contribution of Martin Klaasen and VLDC’s Future Forum perspective.
The future of healthy lighting will not be decided by one person, one company, one standard or one market.
It requires many actors.
- Scientists provide evidence boundaries.
- Designers translate science into space.
- Manufacturers provide products and data capability.
- Control systems provide the time engine.
- Owners provide real needs and investment logic.
- Public sectors provide scalable scenarios.
- Industry platforms provide shared language and collaboration mechanisms.
Co-creation is not just discussion. It must produce outcomes: Trend interpretation. Problem maps. Action recommendations. Demonstration projects. Collaboration lists. Follow-up working groups. Replicable methods.
This is the real value of a Future Forum.
Closing: future lighting is not only better at emitting light. It must be better at serving life
Martin Klaasen and VLDC’s Future Forum perspective adds an essential dimension to deLIGHTed talks Asia @ GILE 2026.
Future lighting is not only more efficient. Not only more intelligent. Not only healthier. Not only better at brand expression. Not only more compliant with a single metric.
Future lighting must be better at serving life. Serving human time. Human emotion. Human behaviour. Human work. Human rest. Human interaction. Human recovery. Long-term building value. Public life in cities.
This is the real meaning of Life Centric Lighting. It is not a new slogan. It is a new mode of industry collaboration.
From Frankfurt to Guangzhou.
From stage to workshop.
From trend to response.
From idea to action.
From Human Centric Lighting to Life Centric Lighting.
From one-way forum to cross-disciplinary co-creation.
From lighting products to life systems.
Good Light Wake-up Call cannot stop at saying: We now know light matters.
The next step must be: Let us make Good Light happen together.
Design it. Measure it. Verify it. Operate it. Co-create it.
That is what needs to happen in Asia after deLIGHTed talks Asia @ GILE 2026.
Good Light Wake-up Call.
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