The Lampshade
It has been an intention of ours to do some lighting for a long time, and the opportunity recently arose after discovering the beautiful work done by Vinegar Hill Pottery down on the south coast. The team hand-made a beautiful glazed blue lamp base for us and this left us with the challenge of starting work on a suitably intricate lampshade.
We have long been curious about the properties of vellum, untreated raw animal skin so thin that it is translucent. It has the characteristics required to let enough light through to light a room, and gives the resulting illumination a lovely warm aura. In fact, it was so suitable that we made no changes to the colour at all - it’s a completely natural untreated shade.
The focus then moved to manipulating the shape in such a way as to make it unique. After some early sketches we unequivocally decided on a folded pattern, with the creases giving the material a chance to play with light and shadow. Each fold was done by hand with a bone folder, taking meticulous care to not damage or blemish the delicate surface of the vellum.
We hope you’ll agree that the result is a stunning expression of the encuir design ethos in lighting. This was a bespoke project, but we are planning to do a number of further explorations in light, including a lighting set that will be made commercially available.
The translucent properties of calfskin vellum.
Vellum is a material, traditionally made from calf skin, used for writing and printing. It is prepared from animal skin, stretched and processed for writing.
You can discover a number of our other bespoke projects in various materials at the links below.