Toshiba has taken a lighting ceremony to celebrate the illumination of the exterior of the Louvre with its new LED lighting on 6 December.

Working in collaboration with the Louvre, Toshiba’s lighting engineers developed and installed six series and ten models of lighting fixtures, including high beam-lamps to illuminate the Pyramid and the palace walls.

Toshiba’s ceremony marked the switching on of some 350 light fittings out of a total of 3,200 that will eventually completely replace 4,500 high energy xenon lamps.

The remaining facades of the Napoleon Court will be completed in April 2012, and the courtyard will follow in 2013.

It’s estimated that LEDs will cut the annual power consumption for exterior lighting by 73%, from 392,000 to 105,000 watt-hour after the total completion.