Interior

The two kinds of LIGHT
The two kinds of LIGHT 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

The two kinds of LIGHT

The Two Kinds of LIGHT

There are two kinds of LIGHT: The GLOW that illuminates and the GLARE that obscures. What do you choose? We are ARTISTS with LIGHT and experts in TECHNOLOGY. 38 years illuminating the finest homes in America.

At Adaptive Design Group, we understand that lighting is far more than visibility—it’s emotion, ambiance, and experience. Every home, from grand estates to intimate residences, presents unique opportunities to shape how light interacts with architecture, interior design, and the natural environment. Choosing glow over glare allows the true beauty of your space to emerge, revealing textures, colors, and forms that would otherwise be lost.

Our approach blends artistry and technology seamlessly. From recessed lighting to decorative fixtures, from art lighting to task and interior design illumination, we carefully balance each layer of lighting. Every choice—intensity, placement, color temperature—is deliberate, ensuring your home is as inviting and functional as it is stunning. Over 38 years, we have honed this craft across the finest homes in America, mastering how light enhances every surface, artwork, and architectural element.

The difference between glow and glare is subtle yet profound. Properly executed glow highlights and flatters, while glare distracts and diminishes the beauty of your home. Our team works with architects, interior designers, and homeowners to achieve lighting that is invisible in technique but unforgettable in experience.

Contact Adaptive Design Group today to discover how the right light can transform your home from ordinary to extraordinary. Choose glow—experience the artistry of light.

Architectural layer of light
Architectural layer of light 640 637 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Architectural layer of light

Architectural Layer of Light

Highlight the structure, celebrate the space.

In every home, the architecture itself is a work of art. The architectural layer of light is our tool for enhancing those structural elements, subtly guiding the eye while accentuating the design intent. From vaulted ceilings and exposed rafters to textured walls, cornices, and intricate moldings, each detail has the potential to tell a story—if illuminated with purpose. Adaptive Design Group specializes in coordinating these elements with precision, ensuring the light enhances, rather than competes with, the architecture.

Our approach begins with visualization—mapping the space, understanding its volumes, lines, and textures. Every ceiling recess, wall plane, and corner receives careful attention. Through detailed planning and specification, we select the ideal fixture type, placement, and intensity to complement the design. The result is lighting that feels natural yet intentional, bringing depth, warmth, and clarity to every surface.

Integration is key. The architectural layer is seamlessly coordinated with decorative, task, interior design, and art lighting, creating a multi-dimensional environment. Dimming and smart controls allow homeowners to fine-tune the atmosphere with ease, reinforcing comfort and usability without compromising elegance.

This layer doesn’t just illuminate—it sculpts the space, emphasizing the architecture’s inherent beauty and supporting the other layers to produce a cohesive, luxurious experience. Every corner, every line, every surface becomes part of the visual narrative, enhancing both the function and feel of the home.

Discover the power of architectural lighting. Contact Adaptive Design Group to elevate your home through purposeful, artful illumination.

#luxurylifestyle #luxuryliving #finebuilding #customhome #lightingdesign @adaptivedg #luxuryinteriors

Liquid Art Display 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Liquid Art Display

Liquid Art display. How do you pick if you can’t read the labels. Lighting design is more than circles and loops on electrical plans and switch symbols. Adaptive’s layers of light and integrated dimming design complete the entire story. #luxurylifestyle #luxuryinteriors #wineconnoisseur #winedisplay #lightingdesign #ledlights #luxuryliving @adaptivedg

On Site Coordination 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

On Site Coordination

On site coordination of our artistic and technical lighting and controls are critical, especially with today’s complex architecture. Hips, valleys, arches, curves and massing galore. The mastery of Michael Upwall Design. Adaptive Design Group is not a Plug and Run lighting design firm. We are artists, technologist, engineers and former contractors. Don’t fake it. Go with the Pros! @upwalldesign @adaptivedg #luxurylifestyle #mountainluxury #parkcitystyle #luxuryarchitect #luxuryinteriors #luxurycustomhomes #luxurylightingdesign #lightingcontrol #ledlightings

Cozy Lighting Design 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Cozy Lighting Design

Cozy lighting design touches are never accidental even in the most intimate of spaces. Thoughtful, artistic, and technically integrated lighting makes a space, never distracts from it. Add ADAPTIVE DESIGN GROUP’S Lighting Design team to your custom home projects in 2021!
Principal, Glenn Merlin Johnson literally wrote the book and is continuing to artistically apply his craft on select homes nationwide.
www.adaptivedg.com @adaptivedg @glenn.johnson.14606 @merlin_light #luxuryliving #luxuryhomestyle #lightingdesign #themoderndesignteam #professionalcollaboration #internationalluxuryalliance #luxurycoastalliving #luxurymountainhomes #luxuryestates #professionallighting #customhomedesign #customhomearchitect #theartofillumination

shape light to furniture
Shape light to furniture 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Shape light to furniture

Shape Light to Furniture

Custom Illumination for Dramatic Presentation

At Adaptive Design Group, we understand that lighting isn’t just about brightening a space—it’s about sculpting and defining every element within it. We specialize in shaping light to perfectly complement your furniture and décor, transforming each piece into a captivating focal point.

Our renowned high-output recessed Merlin Light is a prime example. This versatile fixture can be custom modified to meet your specific design and dramatic presentation needs, delivering precise, powerful illumination exactly where it’s needed. Whether it’s highlighting the textures of a luxurious sofa or accentuating the fine details of an exquisite table, our lighting solutions elevate your interiors with intention and artistry.

With tailored lighting designed to enhance your furnishings, we help create spaces that are as functional as they are breathtaking.

Reach out today to explore how custom lighting can transform your home’s interiors into a masterpiece of light and shadow.

#fineart #luxurylifestyle #customfurniture @adaptivedg #modernarchitecture

Integrated ring light design 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Integrated ring light design

Home gym became the perfect staging area with our integrated ring light design. Cool infinity effect in the wall of mirrors. Add us to your projects team for amazing end results with our artistic lighting designs. www.adaptivedg.com . #lightingdesign #customlightingdesign #luxurylifestyle #interiordesign #luxuryarchitecture

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Merlin Light Installation in Singapore
Merlin Light Installation in Singapore 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Merlin Light Installation in Singapore

Merlin Light Installation in Singapore

Merlin Light installation progress in Singapore captures a rare moment in the journey of fine art illumination — where technology, craftsmanship, and artistic respect converge.

In this project, a massive abstract canvas comes alive under the precision of MerlinLight® optical framing projectors, where light is sculpted to the exact shape of the artwork. One piece framed in perfect light, several more to go — and already the transformation is unmistakable. The vivid movement of color, the texture of brushstrokes, and the energy of the composition are revealed without glare, distortion, or visual noise.

These installations are not about simply lighting a wall. They’re about honoring the artist’s intent. Our magical recessed hidden light sources are designed to disappear into the architecture, allowing the art to command full attention. Every beam is precisely shaped to the canvas, delivering perfect color rendering, low operating heat, and zero UV damaging rays — essential for preserving both the visual integrity and the longevity of valuable works.

Merlin Lights are engineered to be safe for all artistic mediums, including museum-quality collections, which require exceptionally controlled conditions. In homes, galleries, and private collections alike, this technology allows prized artwork to be displayed confidently and beautifully, without fear of degradation or environmental damage.

What makes this Singapore installation particularly special is the scale and boldness of the artwork. Large-format, highly saturated modern pieces demand a lighting solution that can keep pace with their intensity. Flat, generic lighting would diminish their power. Instead, the framed light becomes an invisible border — establishing focus, depth, and separation from surrounding architecture while allowing each color to perform exactly as it was intended.

At Adaptive Design Group, we approach projects like this as both engineers and artists. We evaluate wall composition, viewing angles, surface texture, ambient light conditions, and architectural constraints before a single fixture is placed. This disciplined process ensures that when the lights activate, the experience feels natural, effortless, and quietly breathtaking.

Whether displayed in a private residence, gallery space, or international installation, MerlinLight® systems bring fine art into its truest form — illuminated, protected, and respected.

If your collection deserves museum-quality lighting that disappears into the architecture and elevates every visual detail, we invite you to reach out and begin the journey with us.

Visit Merlin Light For more Information

Artistic and Technical Lighting 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Artistic and Technical Lighting

We work from the Mountains to the Seas providing our Artistic and Technical Lighting and Controls design. Same room, breathtaking in the morning and warm and inviting at night. Swipe left and take a deep breath. #lagunabeach #newportbeach #orangecounty #parkcity @adaptivedg @merlin_light @glenn.johnson.14606

Shaping Light Onto Art for Over 38 Years
Shaping light onto art for over 38 years 589 589 Adaptive Design Group, Inc.

Shaping light onto art for over 38 years

Shaping Light Onto Art for Over 38 Years

A contemporary oil painting, abstract in its rendering and suggesting the flow of a waterfall, becomes a focal point in any space when properly illuminated. At Adaptive Design Group, we understand that lighting art is about more than simply shining a light—it’s about creating a presentation that highlights the work’s depth, color, and emotional impact.

For over 38 years, Adaptive Design Group has been shaping light to showcase collections, working with collectors, architects, and designers to ensure every piece is seen at its best. A key tool in this pursuit is the Merlin Light Framing Projector, a precision fixture designed to highlight art without creating glare, overspill, or harsh shadows. These projectors, combined with careful planning and expert placement, allow each painting to occupy its own space while contributing to the harmony of the room.

Adaptive Design Group’s approach goes beyond simply lighting artwork. Each project integrates lighting design, dimming control design, and integration planning to ensure that the art is complemented by its environment. Every brushstroke, texture, and subtle hue is revealed in a way that feels intentional, refined, and fully immersive.

With Adaptive Design Group, light becomes part of the narrative of the space—enhancing the viewer’s experience while preserving the integrity of the collection. Precision, artistry, and technology converge to transform a simple display into a lasting impression.

Because art deserves more than light—it deserves to be fully revealed.

Light is not a simple utility — it is an extension of the artwork itself. Properly designed, it draws the viewer in, enhances form, and preserves the integrity of the collection. Improperly done, it distracts, flattens, or diminishes. That is why discerning collectors and institutions turn to Merlin Lights for their most important pieces.

Adaptive Design has Shaping light onto art for over 38 years with Merlin Lights.

Contact Us or Visit Merlin Light for more information.