Three Edinburgh Stripes packed their bags and headed south last week all in the name of daylight. No, we weren’t just fed-up with the dreich Scottish ‘summer’, we were off to attend VELUX’s 6th Daylight Symposium.
The biennial, two-day event brought together over 350 people from across the globe to discuss and debate.
I know what you’re thinking – how could you possibly discuss daylight for two whole days. From health, to architecture, to learning, to sleeping patterns, to nature, the lists goes on. Daylight influences and plays a role in everything we do.
Experts in architecture, design, engineering and building congregated in the Tobacco Dock – one of the most Instagram-able buildings in East London – to hear 35 daylight themed lectures.
Having set up in a seat in the back row, team Stripe unpacked all manner of cameras, Dictaphones, videocameras, notebooks and laptops and set to work. Amongst hosting media our job on the day was to man the social media channels. Four in total – Twitter and Instagram for VELUX UK & Ireland and Twitter and Instagram for The Daylight Project.
Flipping between all four, searching hashtags and scrolling through newsfeeds, we live tweeted during the talks. We had to be on the ball to draft instantaneous creative content. We pulled out nuggets of information and quotes from the speakers, overlaying them over stand-out pictures or did a quick Google search to source pictures of the buildings the speakers were talking about.
Trying to negotiate complex daylighting data into 140 characters was a bit of a challenge, but as the engagements rolled in I loved the buzz.
One of the many highlights for me was at dinner on the first night. We got chatting to a building surveyor from Holland who told us how excited he was that VELUX had retweeted him during one of the talks. There was a bit of a jazz hands moment as we owned up.