2023 Light Reach Network: a Solar Framework for Philanthropy in Lighting

Lighting professionals are well-positioned to bring positive social change and facilitate people’s access to light with impactful lighting initiatives that have real short- and long-term personal, educational and economic benefits. Lit outdoor public spaces support communities’ social, cultural and recreational livelihood, increase well-being and reduce the negative impact of light poverty.

A global solar lighting design initiative, Light Reach uses an affordable, replicable and rapidly deployable project model that brings together lighting experts, local users and partners in collaborative design processes. Light Reach is on a mission to advance lighting justice and foster a greater philanthropic culture in our industry.

Learning Objectives

1. What light poverty is and how and why its implications are relevant to lighting design.
2. How humanitarian projects work: players, processes and products.
3. Design as activism in the lighting industry.
4. What philanthropy, social engagement and corporate responsibility can look like in the lighting industry.

Nathalie Rozot
CEO, PhoScope

Nathalie Rozot is a phototect and the founder of the think tank on light PhoScope. She is the recipient of a 2021 WIL Award for the global solar lighting initiative Light Reach, and she has received awards from the IES and the IESNA, as well as grants from NYSCA, NYSERDA and Parsons and fellowships from the Graham Foundation for Architecture, MacDowell and NYFA.

She has taught lighting in Masters programs at the New School’s School of Constructed Environments in New York and in Versailles and Lille’s schools of landscape architecture, and she has published, lectured, and juried internationally. Rozot is a member of the IES and an educator member of the IALD.

Jenny Werbell
NYC Studio Director, Essential Light Design Studio

Jenny Werbell is a senior lighting designer and director of NYC studio at Essential Light Design Studio, and she has served as outreach coordinator for Light Reach since 2021.

She was named a Beverly Willis Architecture Foundation Emerging Leader in 2017 and has received project awards from the IESNA and the IALD.

Jenny has spoken at lighting conferences in the United Kingdom, Dubai and Paris, and has taught at the undergraduate and graduate levels at Parsons in New York and Drexel University in Philadelphia.
She received her Masters of Fine Arts from Parsons School of Design in both Lighting Design and Interior Design.