The Daily Telegraph - Saturday - The Telegraph Magazine
Bright ideas from an innovative lighting designer
a lighting designer’s work is full of bright ideas
MICHAEL Anastassiades’ lighting designs aren’ t glitzy or gargantuan, but they are spectacular nonetheless. the Cypriot, who came to London to study in 1988, works from a studio in his five-storey home near Waterloo station, which also acts as a gallery space for his elegant lights.
Although Anastassiades describes his work as ‘jewellery for the interior’, the simple designs combine function and form – the softly spoken Anastassiades studied civil engineering at Imperial College before taking a master’s in industrial design at the Royal College of Art.
Made from metal, stone and opalescent glass, Anastassiades’ creations are clean-lined (he talks of the quest to find the ‘pure essence’ of a product) without being coldly minimalist. Balance is a recurring visual motif (picture a glass ball perched on the very edge of a brass lamp base), but then Anastassiades has practised yoga for over 20 years, teaching classes for a time.
For most of his career Anastassiades has produced lights like fine art–as one-of fs or in limited edit ions – but was persuaded to design two lighting ranges for the Italian manufacturer Flos in 2013, which were immediate commercial and critical hits. the string Light was short listed for the design Museum’s designs of the Year award in 2014, and t he Flos IC lights (globes set against right angles of brass that can be used in different configurations) won favour with both architects and homemakers (I have the pendant version in my sitting room).
next week, Anastassiades will launch four new lighting collection sat the Euroluce exhibition in Milan. ‘Chroma’ sees the designer exploring colour (verdigris and earthy reds) for the first time ;‘ stone ware’ is a collection of ceramic sc once sand pendants; and lighting integrated into table-like forms has been dubbed ‘Furnitecture’. the future looks bright.