Motoko Ishii

Who is Motoko Ishii?

Motoko Ishii is a Japanese lighting designer. From 1965 to 1967 she worked at lighting-design offices in Finland and Germany. Returning to Japan in 1968, she established the Ishii Motoko Design Office.

One of her major projects was the design for the lighting at Expo '75 in Okinawa. However, the rise in energy costs due to the energy crisis proved to be a problem.

Beginning in the 1980s, she produced the designs for a number of major projects. Three big events for which she was responsible for the lighting were Expo '85 in Tsukuba, the light-up festival of Yokohama, and Japan Flora 2000. She designed lighting for the cities of Osaka, Hakodate, Himeji and Kurashiki, and for the gasshō-zukuri village at Shirakawa.

Her 1989 redesign of the lighting for Tokyo Tower brought international attention. She won the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America Prize for the Light Fantasy Electricity Pavilion at the International Garden and Greenery Exposition and again for the Rainbow Bridge.

Other major projects include Osaka and Himeji Castles; the Akashi Straits and the Yokohama Bay Bridges; the Heisei Building at the Tokyo National Museum; the Gifu World Fresh Water Aquarium; the station building of Tokyo Station; Roppongi Hills Mori Tower, and Ebisu Garden Place.