Nacho Carbonell fills Paris gallery with giant cocooned lamps

Tables and chairs merge into tree-like mesh forms in the work of Spanish designer Nacho Carbonell, who is showing several new pieces at Carpenters Workshop Gallery in Paris.

The Forest exhibition showcases the designer’s series of sculptural Cocoon lights. The latest additions to the series rise two metres high and rest on textured concrete bases.

Created in partnership with the gallery, the pieces feature several steel branches that appear to “grow” out of the base to support lights surrounded by semi-transparent mesh shells.

The steel mesh is covered with a plaster of Carbonell‘s own creation, mixed with sand and textile hardener.

The encased lights – which have been hand-painted by Carbonell – cluster together, much like sections of a tree. Bulbs shine through the gaps in the mesh, which diffuses the light to create a “natural warm glow”.

The pieces continue Carbonell’s existing series of cocoon-shaped lights – previously shown at Carpenters Workshop’s London space. These include hybrid designs that blend elements of lamps and furniture, with lights appearing to grow out of tabletops.

“I like to see objects as living organisms, imagining them coming alive and being able to surprise you with their behaviour,” said the designer, who is based in Eindhoven but has shown his work around the world.

“I want to create objects with my hands, then I can give them my personality. I turn them into communicative objects that can arouse one’s sensations and imagination.”

Carbonell has also designed several pieces of unconventional furniture, including a collection with an elastic outer skin, and a set of spiky table and chair hybrids finished in gravel and broken glass.

His Forest exhibition continues at Carpenters Workshop Gallery in Paris until 17 December 2016.

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• Lighting
• Design