ABSTRACT
No one can deny the historical importance of daylight in determining the form of buildings since, together with the effects of climate and location, daylight availability was fundamental to their design. However, with the introduction of modern sources of electric light, and particularly because of their increasing efficiency since the Second World War, by the 1960s the need to introduce daylight into buildings had appeared to diminish. A number of architectural programmes such as offices, shopping centres, factories, sports buildings and even schools were developed as ‘blind’ or ‘semi-blind’ boxes on the assumption that other environmental factors such as heating, cooling and acoustics would be better served if there were no windows – the best window was no window.
