Philharmonie de Paris, Grande Salle

The stunning Philharmonie de Paris, designed by architect Jean Nouvel and commissioned by the French government and the city of Paris, offers an iconic evocation of what can be achieved when architecture, light and music resonate in exquisite harmony.

L'Observatoire International provided the lighting design for the main Philharmonic Hall.

Glowing gently at the heart of the building is the illustrious Grand Salle music hall, the Philharmonie’s crown jewel. Light, like music, is a vibration, and in the Grand Salle, their frequencies join to create a fully immersive experience for the contemporary concertgoer. Just as the sound reflects off the terraced vineyard structure, the warm amber light bounces off the walls of the room, imbuing visitors with the sensation that both light and sound emanate from within.

The unparalleled acoustic precision of the Grand Salle is mirrored in the precise assimilation of fixtures in the architecture, as custom LEDs–embedded in the celestial plane of “clouds” floating above the audience—warm the room with a sunset glow. The first of its kind and without peer, the Philharmonie de Paris has not only revitalized classical music in Paris but also forever altered the traditional notion of how a symphony space can look, sound, and feel.