Lighting was once again showcased in Milan with the return of Euroluce after a four-year absence, illuminating trends from both Fiera Milano and the Fuorisalone events.
Circus
A notable trend at Euroluce was indirect light, bounced off walls, ceilings, floors, and shades. But no one surpassed the panache of Barcelona brand Vibia, which unveiled its trapeze-inspired Circus suspension system, by Antoni Ariola. The graphic black-and-white group includes globes, spots, shades, tubes, and reflectors that can be arranged in myriad combinations.
vibia.com
Pipe Lights
Stylnove Ceramiche, a producer of porcelain objects and lighting, called on rising Dutch designer Sabine Marcelis for these outdoor wall fixtures. Available in a variety of colors, the extruded fittings playfully subvert the classic glass tube: while their high gloss brings out their beautiful “imperfections,” the ceramic shade’s opacity results in a diffuse, indirect glow.
stylnove.com
Shades
On the Milanese design scene since 1970, the year he left Britain to work with Ettore Sottsass, 81-year-old George Sowden shows no signs of slowing down. Launched at his Corso di Porta Nuova store, the SHADES collection, which follows on the heels of his colorful coffeepots and pepper grinders, proposes pendant, table, floor, and cordless lamps with soft-silicone lightshades. If their decorative Pop ethos recalls Memphis, the mythical 1980s design movement, it’s no accident—Sowden was a founding member.
sowdenlight.com
SCR01
Founded in 2010 to celebrate classic Milanese design, Restart/Milano looked to the 1970s living room stalwart the freestanding hi-fi speaker for their SCR01 standard lamp. Perched on four angled legs, a felt-wrapped aluminum frame contains LEDs diffused into a strong yet ambient back-and-front glow, thanks to white Lycra coverings on both faces. Available with two or threebuttons, or none.
restartmilano.com
Uebu
Scheduled for release this year, the Uebu suspension system by Ljubljana-based, Japanese-inspired Tokio was one of the more poetic offerings at Euroluce. LED strings are mounted inside glass-tube diffusers that are joined by metal connectors to form a blanketlike mesh that can be any size you like, in one of five available colors.
tokiotokio.com
Sistema
Shown by Convey, an “accelerator for design brands,” at events space BasicVillage in Milan’s Farini district, Sistema (“system”) was produced by two young design firms, NM3 and 6:AM Glassworks. Textured glass bricks slide into polished-steel frames to form standard lamps (with marble bases), overhead suspensions, and folding room dividers (the latter without LEDs)—a deceptively simple system that is beautifully effective.
nm3.xyz.com
6am.glass
Cabriolette
First issued as a pendant, Martinelli Luce’s playful pivoting Cabriolette is now available in a whole family of variants, including table, standard, and wall lamps. Designed by Italian creative agency Studio Natural (industrial designer Marco De Santi and graphic designer Alessandro Paoletti), it was one of many fixtures proposing indirect, reflected light at this year’s Euroluce.
martinelliluce.it
Product
Italian heavyweight Artemide is producing this modular system with Herzog & de Meuron. Named Dreispitz (German for “triangle”), it comprises a triangular core, carrying from one to three LED tubes, and will be available in black, silver, or green as a wall/ceiling, floor or suspended fixture (with an optional diffuser for the downward-oriented tube). This versatile solution was developed for an artist’s studio, say the architects.
artemide.com
K830
Stretching back to 1919, Midgard was among the oldest brands at Euroluce. Offering a mix of new and heritage pieces, the German firm is best known for its TYP 113 from the 1920s, which caught the eye of Walter Gropius and traveled the world after the Bauhaus was disbanded. Gropius would no doubt have been appreciative of the 830, designed by 27-year-old Werner Glasenapp in 1930 and originally made by Kandem—hence the K in the labeling of this 2023 reissue. Wall-mounted and articulated, the K830 has a swiveling shade, to direct light wherever you wish.
midgard.com
