A liquid crystal device (LCD) includes from the viewing side: a first electrode layer; a viewing side first liquid crystal (LC) alignment layer; an LC layer; a non-viewing side second LC alignment layer; and a second electrode layer; wherein one of the electrode layers is a common electrode layer and the other of the electrode layers is a segmented electrode layer, and at least one of the first and second LC alignment layers is a bistable alignment layer that is switchable between a first alignment state and a second alignment state. The LCD is operated by applying a first voltage pulse to the segmented electrode layer and applying a second voltage pulse to the common electrode layer (Vcom pulse), the first and second voltage pulses combining to form a resultant voltage pulse. The bistable alignment layer switches from the first alignment state to the second alignment state when a magnitude of the resultant voltage pulse exceeds a switching voltage threshold.