Every other week, we propose a Limburg design icon together with Sjiek / Het Belang Van Limburg, or one that is well on its way to becoming one. This week it is Terra Light by Lauren Van Driessche for Serax.

WHAT: terracotta lighting collection with cylindrical base and adjustable spherical lamp

YEAR: 2016

The best designs often start from a personal necessity. This is also the case with Lauren Van Driessche from Maasmechelen. “ My boyfriend and I had been looking for suitable lighting for our home for a long time,” she says. But even after that long search she – graduated as an interior architect and her friend as an architect – did not find what they liked, which meant she had to give it her own twist. “I had been working on ceramics for a while and decided to start experimenting.”

BREAKING POTS

At the end of 2015 she worked diligently on a design in her own ceramic-studio that she had set up in her father’s furniture company in Genk. “It became a birthday present for my friend”, and so April 2016 became a self-imposed deadline. A deadline she met. “I liked it so much that my friend urged me to submit it to a Serax design competition.” The Belgian success company in lifestyle and interior accessories had set up a “Win your own design” competition together with Knack Weekend at the end of 2016. There too, Van Driessche managed to put herself in the limelight with the refined minimalist terracotta lamp.

“When Serax decided to put my design into production, I could hardly believe it,” she still recalls. But on top of the pleasure to see your design go into production, a world introduction at the Paris trade fair “Maison & Object” came in early 2018. As well as the commercial response to this. The Terra Light collection now includes four different models. The principle is always the same: a cylindrical base on which the spherical lamp rests. “With a white glaze on the inside, the lamp provides a beautiful reflection of the light. The sphere itself can then move effortlessly on the empty cylinder and so you can shine it in any desired direction. ”

CHARACTER

With the Terra Light collection, Lauren Van Driessche has undeniably focused on the following spots of international design. Certainly in the lap of a company such as Serax, which has long had a successful formula to market affordable design worldwide thanks to smart production in large numbers. “Ceramics are really my thing,” she says. “And that is where the experiment takes precedence. I still have so many ideas and there is still so much possible. ” This is now reflected in a tableware collection and experimental objects in-house. Nevertheless, it is already beyond dispute that Lauren Van Driessche is driven by a passion and not by commerce. She likes to make items with lots of character, experimental objects that demand attention, and works from a necessity. After all, that’s how she came to that lamp and who knows what is coming, it will undoubtedly overshadow the Terra Light.

Terra Light diameter 12 cm (D) and height 29 cm (H) costs € 75.90. The D16 H39 version costs € 97.90, D25 H51 € 130.90 and D31 H36 € 130.90 www.laurenvandriessche.com