datavisualisation ch
internet blog

featuring:
weather.tower, permanent illumination Brussels Dexia Tower

31.05.2010

'Wather Tower is an urban installation from the belgian Design Agency Lab[au]. It forecasts tomorrow's temperature, cloudiness, precipitations, and wind, by using colors and geometrical patterns to visualize/transcribe real-time data provided by the Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium.

The visualization is based on the lightning concept by Space Canon of the Dexia Tower in Brussels. The building has a total of 6,000 windows behind each is a lighting fixture consisting on average of 12 light bulbs, each with three LEDs - a green, a red and a blue - that can be combined into a complete colour palette. The reflection on the closed blind illuminates the whole surface of the window.

A color-code corresponds to tomorrow's temperature compared to the monthly average, linked to a scale of color-temperatures ranging from violet ( -6° or colder ), blue ( -4° ), cyan ( -2° ), green ( monthly average ), yellow ( 2° ), orange ( 4° ) to red ( 6° or warmer ).

For example: When tomorrow's temperature is two degrees higher than the monthly average, the tower colors 'yellow'. Furthermore, the level (dark / light) of this color corresponds to the light-condition of the sky of the upcoming day.'