Turning Kitsch Into Couture. Teardrop Lighting by Bodo Sperlein.

Bodo Sperlein's work for Lladro and Nymphenberg caught my eye years ago and since then, I've been a fan of his elegant pieces and home decor. His Red Berry and Dibbern Black Forest Dinnerware have long been atop my wishlist. Here's yet another unique collection by Sperlein that preserves an endangered skill and turns it into contemporary pieces for the home.



His unique collection of pendant lighting, Teardrop, highlights Bodo Sperlein’s interest in preserving and celebrating traditional skills. In this case, he has re-imagined and updated hand-made bone china flowers which had fallen out of style and were considered kitsch.

With such a small group of ladies left in Staffordshire dedicated to this craft of handmaking, Sperlein sought to ensure that these skills survived into the 21st century and did so by taking delicate and detailed plain white bone china flowers and fusing them to dramatic hand blown teardrop-shaped borosilicate glass pendants. In addition to looking unusual, they cast flower shaped shadows.




Available in two sizes, you can buy them online here.

See more work by Bodo Sperlein here.

Blackboard Coated Pendant Lamps Are A Canvas For Creativity.

These suspension lamps by In-Es ArtDesign double as a canvas for creativity. Covered in matte black blackboard paint, they can be doodled upon with chalk.



Whether you decorate them with messages, designs or leave them blank, the pendant lamps which come in three different shapes with various colored interiors, work beautifully in any environment.






These lamps are also available with a concrete-like paint finish for those who want a lighter look, as shown below.



Learn more at In-Es ArtDesign

The Neon Angelica Chandelier by Nucleo.

Angelica is a modern chandelier designed by Nucleo, a design group based in Italy. The design concept - a chandelier in eighteenth century style revisited in modern key - was to eliminate any super-structures, thus making light the only protagonist.




Angelica outlines its presence in space by evoking the past with soft lines that subtly recall the style of the eighteenth century. The chandelier lights up with an intensely soft light, creating an effect that is poetically suggestive and sophisticated.





The bearing structure is created in aluminium with laser-cut plexiglass elements:



Available in white, aquamarine blue, orchid lilac, mint green.

Diffuser: fluorescent neon (white glass tubes charged with argon)

Light source: total 125W (cold cathode)

Size: 120 x 100 cm

Design: Nucleo

Manufacturer: ALT Lucialternative

Swarovski Amplify - 6 New Glowing Lanterns By Yves Behar's Fuse Project.

The AMPLIFY chandelier’s aim is to put the Swarovski crystal effect into the hands of more people through the simple construction, easily accessible light source and sustainable materials.

Designer Yves Behar and his Fuse Project designed 6 different shaped lamps, each one carefully crafted to maximize refractions on the inner surfaces. This effect can be seen on the faceted shade material, thus emulating the cut and reflective nature of the crystal inside. Each chandelier becomes its own large glowing crystal.




While the Fuse Project's previous large scale lighting sculptures have showcased the crystal in a grand scale, with this latest project they wanted to bring the notion of accessibility and sustainability to crystal lighting.

Traditional chandeliers are made of numerous lights and crystals, they wanted to change this equation: 1 crystal + 1 low energy LED light + a faceted paper shade = AMPLIFY.



Resulting in multiple beautiful reflections and rainbow color bursts… Just what is expected from crystal, but this time the effect is amplified to get the most out of just one crystal.



AMPLIFY is a beautiful single crystal light, or it can be grouped to create a bigger effect.




Each of the six chandeliers will be available in production from Swarovski in the next year. To continue to amplify the concept of accessible crystal, each of the six unique lantern shapes are housed in a flat package that echoes the shape of the chandelier it contains:

The packaging graphics are simple and illustrative to reflect the different shade shapes and components contained inside.



Fuse Project
Swarovski

Fun Little Finds For A Fabulous Home. Chic Decor Items You Can Buy Online.

Letter Light Lamps

Letter lights by Brooklyn artist Amy Adams are pendant lights that have initials made of perforations in the 5" diameter shades. Available as hardwired or switch cord lamps. buy a bunch and spell out a word or get your initial for a simple touch.
Buy them here.


Camera Candle and Transistor Radio Candle

Clean burning hand poured beeswax candles shaped like a vintage polaroid camera or transistor radio made great gifts. Nontoxic, non allergenic and slow burning.
Buy them here.

TREET - air freshener stand


Let's face it. Home air fresheners are just plain ugly, so why not have fun with them? the TREET air freshener holder comes in two stules. A urinating dog or a child reading. Made of perspex, they come with a classic kitschy pine tree air freshener.

buy them here.

Pink and Blue Higgins Mobiles



In an exclusive partnership with Jonathan Adler, they are carrying fused enamel glass mobiles by Higgins Studio. Made with strong piano wire the handmade mobiles are signed by the studio.



Buy them here

Scabetti's Newest Lamps from 100% Futures Show

One of the exhibitors in 100% Futures, a section from the 100% Design show going on now in London, is Dominic Bromley of Scabetti Designs.

His lamps in the show are fabulous and will be released for purchase any day now. You can say you saw them here first!

His pendant lamp collection:


And his amazing Shoal light :
The light/sculpture is comprised of three layers of translucent bone china fish that are suspended from a ceiling fixture, thereby creating a snapshot of a dense shoal of fish swarming around a light source. This cylindrical shoal has an outer diameter of 2m.





The designer behind Scabetti is the English born Dominic Bromley and his wife, Frances. Although trained in product design, it was the world of interiors (and the varied objects that inhabit that world) that most interested him. Having been raised in North Staffordshire, a part of England with a rich heritage in ceramics, it was only natural that his desire to create strong sculptural forms should become manifested in clay.


Above: Dominic and Frances Bromley



In the world of Scabetti, function has to follow form. Dominic Bromley has and is still influenced by the work of mid-century artists such as Jean Arp, Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore. Furniture design is always a real inspiration, particularly the chairs of Scandinavian designers such as Eerio Aarnio (plastic fantastic) and Arne Jacobsen (beautiful wooden furniture and classic egg chair) and mid-century designers such as Charles and Ray Eames, right through to the stunning polished aluminium loungers of Marc Newson.

visit the Scabetti site here.

For further information on Scabetti, Dominic and Frances Bromley, please
telephone (during UK working hours) +44 (0) 1538 371 471 or email