Reading Lamps

Reading Lamps

Designer Vesa Honkonen says:

“In the late summer of 2004, some officials from Heinola contacted me to ask if they could use the same lighting solution that I’d designed for Raisio and a couple of other small towns in Finland. The Raisio light network had been completed in 2002.But I didn’t want to repeat myself, and I’d also promised the City of Raisio that I wouldn’t use the same solution in Finland within the next seven years. So I told Heinola that we could design them something of their very own. A small library square was the place where they wanted something unique. I decided to start from scratch with a fresh take on livening up the square and street.

I imagined reading lamps stepping out of the library and dancing in the street, filling the square with chaos and movement. The lamps grew bigger and bigger, and took over the street. “This area is ours, we call the shots here!” they shouted. These strange lamps continued to grow, and began to look around. They found themselves in unfamiliar territory, in an urban environment. In a state of confusion, they bent every which way, looking from side to side and over their shoulders. After a while they calmed down, and their movements began to slow.

The lamps became rooted to the spot, accepting their form and position. The time for movement was over, and an air of calm satisfaction settled over them. These frozen movements took three different forms. The lower part of the pole is the same in all three versions, while the middle sections were bent in three different directions. The lamps are the same in all three variations. This enabled us to create three unique types of lamp, with a total of fifteen lamps in the installation.

It was clear from the outset that we would use multimetal lamps as the light source, as they would produce a strong point light all the way down to street level. We didn’t want to create an even light – we wanted the uneven light and stark contrasts that are the stuff of nightmares for every talented lighting designer. These lamps create sharp beams of light on the street surface, revealing the form of the light emitting from their bodies. I wanted the light to erupt out of a black hole and spread out in different directions.”