A Cut Glass Light Bulb

Lee Broom has combined lead crystal and the humble light bulb and produced an attractive and sparkling new light fixture.

We have all come to love the iconic simple light bulb, the instrument that gave us electric light when the sun goes down. There was a time a simple exposed light bulb was considered gauche and crude. It was covered with paper, glass, silk even alabaster to disguise and diffuse it. Today we love it for it's simplicity and iconic image of light and illumination.

So to see the shape embraced in lead crystal and hand cut to give it the elegance of an old decanter is beautiful and charming, it lets the light sparkle.

As lighting designers we are always most fascinated by the effect of light, how it shines, its brilliance, it's dazzle and glow, how it fills the space or how it defines a mood.

To achieve this effect the type of light is important but what really helps is the material the light shines through and in this instance of lead crystal cut glass it gives a gentle spread of light with a twinkle. It is romantic and flattering to all.

These lights will illuminate many restaurants, clubs and cafes. This light will glow next to a bed or a row will give a dining table a chic elegance. It is a beautiful addition to our lighting palette.

This display is from Lee Broom's East London studio on Rivington Street that was transformed into a general store for the London Design Festival. These lights are hand made in Cumbria, the last producer of lead crystal in Britain, I hope he has thousands of orders.

Tent, Designjunction, Designers Block

Tent on Brick Lane, Designjunction on Southhampton Row and Designers Block in Clerkenwell are 3 of the many venues of the London Design Festival. These shows had many exhibitors who are designing and making their own products and the range was extensive from hand woven lampshades, rugs, knitting, recycling, ceramics, lighting and those are a few of the items. The work I was most taken with was the furniture.

The most spectacular piece of furniture was the Tree Table by Benchmark. Tree is a gigantic 11.4m (37’5”) table made from a single plank of oak ‘balanced’ on a mirror polished stainless steel pyramid. It is from a tree 140 years that had been growing in France.

Tree Table by Benchmark

There were many excellent furniture makers who were using beautiful solid woods creating sculptural designs, elegant and simple that fit the forms of the body. Some of my favorites:

What attracts one to the many beautiful products on exhibit depends much on current projects and passions. I particularly found the well designed and crafted furniture in solid wood very attractive, the use of different woods: walnuts and oak, ash, sycamore, mahogany and meranti.

And one other item I thought was a real accomplishment of design, technology and engineering was the LED table lamp by Jake Dyson, beautiful in its elegance and simplicity. And more on that later.

Fitzrovia

Fitzrovia is a part of London that has had a mixed and bohemian past and it is still much that way today with a collection of advertising and media companies, fashion and furniture, design schools, plus the theatre, it is a rich, varied and creative area.

For London Design Festival the furnishing showrooms were open and displaying their collections:

The Republic of Fritz Hansen has a newly renovated showroom, spacious, lots of light and carries all the great classics of Danish and Scandinavian design of the 20th century.

The European Design Center has an equally distinguished selection of furnishings and displayed with sharp color.

and from Minotti, deep charcoal and luxurious sectional sofas:

And another was The Material Lab where they had talks and workshops on the use of different materials for all surfaces. One product they provide is a very thin porcelain tile that can be made in all dimensions, textures and colors. And they piled up boxes and crates for display.

Redchurch Street, Shoreditch

When London Design Festival began last Tuesday, I started in East London on Redchurch Street, Shoreditch. It is an old street that was some time ago small factories, workshops and garages. Today the workshops and old garages are cleaned up, redesigned and made into fashionable cafes and shops.

First stop was Cafeand, a cafe and a shop selling home made foods, furniture and decorative items: www.cafeand.co.uk

A few doors down was Tracey Neuls, www.tn29.com, a chic shoe store that has teamed up with furniture maker Faudet-Harrison:

Tracey's shoes are colorful, practical and stylish and shown with the post-modern ironic accessories by Faudet-Harrison.

Lots of graffiti on the street, next stop was Cubit:

Cubit is a great shelving system of well made modular boxes that fit and stack up holding all kinds of books and ornaments. It is a system that does not have the infuriating Ikea instruction sheets and eliminates the need for a carpenter, wow... storage made easy, portable and attractive.

When I went in to Cubit, there was some great Rock and Roll playing on a portable record player, the D-Jay playing old 45's

Across the street was the Concept Lounge at The Gallery an exercise in generating ideas and a forum for interdisciplinary exchange.

Further down the street was Maison Trois Garcons, a treasure trove of vintage and antique

At the end of the street was a pop up shop of sculptural handmade leather bags by Larissa Hadjio

And on the corner was a pop up bar, Bar Alto with the DesignMarketo group featuring new take on the Duralex tumbler. 

Redchurch Street reminds me much of other urban areas that go through good times, then bad, than a renewal as a new generation of artists, designers, architects and chefs need good, inexpensive places to start up their businesses. Also along the street, but were closed when I got there, were many clothing stores. Soho in New York was much like that in the 70's, many parts of Brooklyn, Oakland and Detroit are going through revival, Shoreditch is well on its way.