The need for natural materials to replace synthetics in our homes is driving innovation in all areas of design. Typically high on plastic and glass content, lighting is particularly up for scrutiny. While some have provocatively returned to the likes of animal bladders in search of organic translucency, others have looked to natural fiber favorites such as rattan, cane and linen. For others, it’s a choice of minerals such as alabaster, whose properties allow for beautiful ambient diffusion of light. And the search goes on.
Joining the quest for earth-friendly translucency is French designer Elise Fouin, a one-time member of Andrée Putman’s studio. Nebulis, her latest design for Paris-based lighting makers Forestier, follows her successful airy creations for the brand, the Papillon and Libellule collections, both inspired by ethereal nature. Nebulis, on the other hand, is made by nature in a gossamer-light yet solid form.
An Age-Old Material Reworked for Modern Times
Nebulis resulted from the research-led textile innovator Sericyne. Set up by the Boulle school graduate Clara Hardy, Sericyne explores inventive new ways to process silk –spun in the centuries-old silk-producing area of Cévennes in southern France– into modern materials with new applications.
Rethinking how silk transforms into a malleable material, Sericyne, which has headquarters at Parisian brand incubator space Station F and a production workshop in Monoblet in the heart of Cévennes, has merged the making of silk with the making of products. The multi-disciplinary team has devised a way for the silkworms to spin their threads directly over molds so that a light, translucent layer is naturally formed in 3D. Alternatively, the worms spin their fibers in a flat meshed layer which can then be applied in pieces by hand over a mold.
Material First, Then Comes Form
It’s a material and process that captivated both Fouin and Forestier, a lighting company that champions natural materials and hand-making. "When I discovered Sericyne silk, it reminded me of Japanese washi paper but with more resistant qualities, while remaining very light in terms of weight," says the designer. "I found this innovation in the process of using silk alongside the material’s simultaneous lightness and solidity, [which was] perfect to apply to the field of lighting design."
Fouin, in fact, goes against the grain in her design process, often investigating material before form. The tactility, the visuals and the properties of the material come to inform the shape of her design. "The material, the manufacturing techniques and the life cycle of the material is a great source of inspiration for me," she explains. "The form then comes into my head once I have been able to digest all these aspects."
Naturally Weightless Volume
From Fouin’s exploration into Sericyne’s non-woven silk, the form of Nebulis evolved into terraced mounds that suspend cloud-like as pendants, or sit flush to the wall or ceiling like luminescent sculptures. For reasons of time efficiency, the meshed threads were applied in pieces to the molds in light layers, rather than spun over them, before being left to set and then lifted off the molds. The form has remarkable volume and structure combined with unexpected weightlessness.
Forestier’s Nebulis ticks all the boxes of modern product design. It leans on the natural world and innovation in age-old materials. It picks up a heritage material –silk– from a place steeped in making expertise, and reworks it for modern-day usage. It puts to good use the properties of this new-but-old material; its translucency, lightness of weight but solidity of form. And it brings us a poetic new piece of lighting that doesn’t challenge the carbon balance.