The Luminaire Project, our first full length project at University lasting almost 3 months long. PYRA is being exhibited at the Light and Build fair this year in Frankfurt.
Sponsored by Xicato, Mike Stoane Lighting and the LET (Lighting Education Trust), we were given the task of designing a luminaire for either a domestic or commercial environment whilst sticking to the style and product themes of the mentioned companies.
After my research process I narrowed down the themes which I wanted to work with and towards; modularity, interaction and dynamics. I wanted to design a product where no two had to look the same, where you could buy the same product as me but we both have different ways of displaying it in our own environment, thus expressing our own creative outputs wherever we chose to place it.
Working with aspects of geometry, organic forms and repetition, I started to create growing and expanding forms using protopaper which proved to be a strong material for dirty prototypes.
Held together by wire and glue, I wanted to quickly express how this form could change into something dynamic whilst letting the user have control over the lighting effect.
(- I’ll add a link to their website at the end where you can see for yourself what can be created in a few minutes).
My first few CAD renders greatly helped me with visualising the lighting effect. Selecting polished copper and transparent acrylic as my two main materials, I experimented with the different reflections and shadows cast on a wall environment.
I began to imagine an entire wall installation with many of these forms spread out across a large surface area.
As we were given the one LED module to use, this project worked towards a prototype which I could later think about the expansion of into multiple modules.
I would like to add more to these CAD renders to show the bigger picture of this project and what it could eventually become.
The final prototype was created using 3D printed pryamids which I created on Solidworks. Half were sprayed copper and the other half were translucent plastic – ideally these would have been transparent but due to cost and material availability this wasn’t an option.
Each pyramid had an inlay on each edge for a magnetic strip which sat flush to the surface. This enabled the components to easily be taken off, moved and changed around to suit the user. Without the need for screws or additional fittings to do this, it means that it can be manipulated by users of all ages with little to no safety hazards.
Please feel free to have a look at my presentation boards which explain more about how the product is used and installed as well as a booklet with some quick, in-depth information about a few stages of the project.
Protopaper – Protopaperlab & Purchase here from the LGC – London Graphics Centre – Protopaper
Thank you for reading!
