marble lamp

First exhibited at Ganapati South Indian Restaurant Peckham, London 2017

Supported by the Matter of Stuff Residency in Carrara, Italy 2016

Supported by the Marius Dean Travel Bursary 2016

The common use of high grade marble in the design industry often fails to render visible the issues that the continued excavation of this material is having on the environments it belongs to.

Following a number of trips to the city of Carrara, Italy, and its neighbouring region, where we connected with local artists and visited quarries, workshops, artist studios, and local businesses, it became evident that much of the industrial processes associated with the use of marble produce large amounts of waste.

The search for alternative uses for this waste was a topic of discussion for the local art community at the time, who were becoming more proactive towards the visibilisation of the impact the marble industry was having on their environment, through continued extraction of the material even as an abundance of it sat discarded and unused.

Marble Lamp was a result of these experiences, trying to move away from the over-polished and wasteful use of marble predominant in design, and instead design by listening to and engaging with local knowledge and concerns.

The lamp makes use of marble dust as an organic light shade that can be freely adjusted through the movement of the lamp, providing an interaction that feels less technical and more spontaneous. The placement of the light bulb in an off-centered position means that the lamp will throw a different amount of light depending on which face it is resting on.

useful links: user manual & how to replace the lightbulb

press: Yanko Design ❘ 2017 / Core77 ❘ 2017