The poet of the light, Michael Anastassiades, Designer of the Year at Maison&Objet Paris January 2020

When Michael Anastassiades launched his eponymous lighting brand in 2007, the first fair at which he presented his new designs was MAISON&OBJET. Now, most aptly, he is coming back as Designer of the Year. In the interval, he has become one of the most poetic and prolific lighting designers working today.

In his work, the Cypriot designer uses simple shapes and volumes – a sphere, a line, a circle to create a rich language where uncertainty and imbalance are embraced. The illusionary simplicity of his designs is a labour of love, and not something easily achieved. In his view, designers are there to create relationships and interactions between people and objects.

After training as a civil engineer and taking a master’s degree in industrial design at the Royal College of Art, the Cypriot designer founded his studio in London in 1994 and his eponymous brand in 2007.

Although best known for his lighting, he has designed with the same rigour and clarity in all fields: furniture for the likes of B&B Italia, Herman Miller, Cassina; drinking glasses for Lobmeyr; speakers for Bang & Olufsen; a public project in Mint Street, London; a drinking fountain for the Victoria & Albert Museum. His work can be found in permanent collections at the Museum Of Modern Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, the MAK in Vienna, the Crafts Council in London and the FRAC Centre in Orleans France.

MASTER OF LIGHT

Anastassiades believes that to design a light, one first has to embrace darkness: he sees no need to turn night into day. Lights for him are a source of warmth, and what fascinates him most is the glow. When designing a light, he takes into consideration that a lamp is off 80% of the time, so he takes the time to figure out the relevance of the object when switched off. In his vision, a lamp is never an isolated object because it has to interact with its environment.

He was drawn to lighting early on, for its poetic qualities, but was aware that no company would hire him until he had made a name for himself. Instead of being discouraged, he decided to take the development and production of his designs in his own hands. Starting his own brand gave him the chance to test the boundaries and design without compromises. By the time he started to collaborate with Flos he had gained experience and was ready for new challenges. He had unexpected freedom to invent, and could count on the expertise of the company to experiment with technical solutions that up to that moment had not been available to him. His projects became more ambitious.

APPARENT SIMPLICITY

Michael Anastassiades’s almost obsessive search for the essence of an object leads him to a misleading simplicity: it takes a lot of effort to make something look simple. The simplicity encourages curiosity, and curiosity leads to participation and interaction, a constant feature of all Anastassiades’s projects. A perfect example is The Fleet Drinking Fountain, which conceals the technical aspects without compromising aesthetics and has become more of an experience than just a place to stop and fill a bottle.

TIMELESS OBJECTS

For Michael Anastassiades sustainability is a perverse idea. He strongly believes we should surround ourselves with objects that will last a very long time, that design should not be shortsighted. His desire is to design for the long term and indeed his objects have a timeless quality to them.

«For me, it is important to always show something different, make sure that what I design explores a new idea, uses new technology in a poetic way»

MAISON&OBJET was the first fair at which Michael Anastassiades presented his eponymous brand. It was an important time for him and a chance to define and develop the identity of his brand. This January he wants to offer an experience. For the very first time, all 16 of his Mobile Chandeliers, will be showcased together: in the dark space, the lights, propelled by motors, will move as if planets. Once more, Anastassiades is working simultaneously with the qualities and conditions of darkness and light.

Maison&Objet will be held from 17 to 21 January 2020

Source: Maison&Objet
Top image by Flos
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