Even though well after 11 p.m., Leo Valen and his wife sat on a park bench on the grounds of the Hilton Hawaiian Village and watched a swan glide gracefully across a light-streaked pond. The aristocratic creature bathed in silvery light even though a dense cloud cover hid the full moon.

The shimmering light was supplied by the landscape illumination of John Watson Landscape Illumination Inc., a Dallas, Texas-based company specializing in design/build projects. Since the company installed 160 features on the hotel’s 22-acre compound last January, guests have enjoyed the lushly landscaped terrain after sunset as well as before.

“Everything was dark before they installed the lights,” said Valen, who has been visiting the Hilton Hawaiian Village since 1964. “We love to sit here at night and look at the birds and trees,” continued the retiree from Santa Rosa, California.

The hotel, which is the largest in Hawaii with 2,523 rooms, began a $100 million architectural renovation of the 35-year-old complex.

“We created a design to illuminate the hotel’s key profit centers?EUR??,,????'??+its restaurants and bars,” said Thomas Johnson, representing the lighting company in Hawaii. “The hotel wanted the property to look inviting and secure at night, so guests t would be more likely to take advantage of the hotel’s bars, eateries and entertainment instead of leaving the property for dinner and drinks.”

Today, the serpentine pathways passing by ponds, waterfalls, statues and exotic birds are just as crowded at midnight as at high noon. “That’s how I measure our success, said Johnson.

Jeanne Park, the hotel’s spokeswoman, said the landscape lighting allows the village to maximize its substantial investment in the property’s landscape and grounds. During the 1988 renovation, the hotel spent $4 million on annuals, perennials, shrubs and rockscapes to complement the 60-foot palm trees t already lining the beach.

Watson personally designed the fixture plan for the hotel, at a cost of less than $150,000. The Hilton property posed a series of challenges for the seasoned landscape illuminator. A pond near the commodious front desk was the natural habitat for rare red winged flamingos. The hotel horticulturist was insistent on not disturbing the sleeping habits of the birds. This meant that no extraneous light could be used on the pond.

A solution was reached by directing the light away from the bird’s nests. Instead, limpid beams reflect into their pond. “The birds think there’s a full moon,” Johnson said.

Watson sat beside the front desk and watched guests arrive before determining a grand plan for the porte-cochere and entry building. “I feel an exiting design is important at check-in because the view creates the first impression of the hotel,” he said. “I’ve checked into many hotels at night and have had no feeling of the hotel’s identity or personality. I made certain Hilton guests would have a definite feeling of entry when they arrived.”

The landscape illuminator recognized the importance of entry lighting early in his career. One of his first commercial projects was a hotel in South Carolina. Because lighting in trees was a new concept, the owner asked Watson to make a presentation to its New York bankers. The starched financiers sat in stone-faced silence for the first 20 minutes. Then one banker spoke. “Every time I visit a hotel at night I can never find the hotel, much less the entry.” Watson received his funding and a good lesson in illumination design.

From the open air lobby, guests are treated to grand vistas of the 10,000 square-foot “super pool.” Here, shielded lights were installed high in the mastodonic palm trees. The height of these trees made the two-week installation tricky, Johnson recalled. “It was like hanging lights on a flimsy telephone pole, the palm trees sway in the wind; there are no limbs to hang onto when the trade winds blow.”

Because the Village is frequently sold out, the installers had to hang lights while guests were paying up to $275 a night to enjoy their vacations. The crews worked hard not to discommode any guests. They installed lights by the heavily traveled walkways at sunrise, when most guests were asleep. One crew member was stationed under the tree at all times.

Guests became fascinated with the spectacle of the installers shimmying up 60-foot trees holding hefty fixtures. Many would gather at the base of the trees to watch the crews work. Some captured the process with telephoto lenses. One vacationer even wrote Johnson a letter describing her respect for the daring and skill of the installation crew.

The fixtures they installed are energy efficient. The gas discharge lamps are designed to last five to eight years burning from sundown to daybreak. The lamps are also specially treated to withstand the salt spray. Experience gleaned from installing lights in Florida, the Bahamas and the lower Carribean helped refine the formula for the salt resistant coating.

Watson is pleased with completion of this phase of the lighting design. “The Hilton Hawaiian Village is one of the most exciting hotel properties in the world,” he said. “It is gorgeous in the day time. Our goal was to make the property more beautiful at night than it was during the day.”

In Leo Valen’s view, he succeeded.