Nebula (2007)

When Piero Gandini, owner of renowned Italian lighting brand Flos, approached me after seeing the Reinventing Functionality project, I was a bit overwhelmed at first. I knew all the artists that worked with Flos and to be honest it felt a bit intimidating, since I didn’t have much experience in making industrial designs. But after welcoming me with true Italian generosity, Flos became the first of the few big design firms I started to collaborate with. I wanted to make something elegant and timeless out of the anonymous and the ordinary; perhaps a bit in the tradition of Achille Castiglioni, but in my own way. So I created this blown glass version of a cluster of old lampshades I found when browsing a local flea market. While shuffling them into different compositions, I was struck by the strength of the image that appeared by combining them in a bunch like an explosion of light, with almost no symmetry, but with a natural harmony in its composition.

(photocredits: JL, FLOS)