Spotlight Twister and her sibling Twister Line, designed by architect Jani Kristoffersen, is a sophisticated homage to the geometric lines of the 1980’s and to light itself. Originally bespoke for Fotografiska London, a project unfortunately delayed due to the situation in the world, the Twister family sprung from a flirt with the industrial romance. A romance, that soon turned in to a love affair.
”The Fotografiska house has been a joy to work with. It is a 1980’s office building with all the qualities of the postmodern era. It has strong, geometrical primary forms that we’ve pushed further, building our own universe based on squares and circles”, explains Jani.
In this project, the devil is truly in the details. Merging the disciplines of architecture and product design, Design Campus had the opportunity to take a holistic approach on the interior design.
”We wanted to make sure that this world we’ve created was a perfect one, down to the floor mats. We’ve designed our own products, integrating the building’s geometric shapes into the design.”
"It felt really good working with people that know lighting technology and how to solve all the details. As we didn’t want to compromise on size and shape it took some serious engineering skills." Jani Kristoffersen, Design Campus
Primary light form
The result of the collaboration is called Twister, a sleek spotlight for focused accent lighting, and her sibling Twister Line, a generic tube of light that creates patterns and directions. With a design that communicates its area of use and architectural residence, the Twister family has the qualities of a future post-postmodern classic.
”When it comes to lighting, working with geometrical forms comes naturally. Going back in history the circular form has been the primary choice when letting daylight in to a building”, says Jani. ”We’ve played with the primary forms, with the ambition to reduce the design as far as possible. I think the shape of the handle, for Twister, has a strong symbolism, which corresponds with the postmodern expression.
The same goes for her sister, Twister Line, that is a generic luminaire – a product that, when it is used creatively, can enhance and transform a venue and its impression. With simple adjustments you can easily create multiple patterns, or recipes, with these glowing tubes. I find it to be a an amazing tool for me as a designer.”
Lighting was no exception
Established by the Broman Brothers in Stockholm in 2010, Fotografiska has become a huge success and one of Sweden’s most popular destinations. In 2019 they opened in New York and Talinn. The London branch, located in the dynamic Whitechapel area, is housed in a 1980’s office building that has undergone a radical transformation orchestrated by Design Campus.
”We’ve had the honour to work with Fotografiska in their original venture and of course we were really happy to get this opportunity”, says Design Campus's co-founder Jani Kristoffersen.
”We looked at a number of different luminaires but didn’t find anyone that corresponded with our world. So we decided to go for our own design. The trick was to find a partner that could develop our ideas with the proper lighting technology and put the luminaires into production. We were told that Fagerhult was the obvious choice.”
The co-operation with Fagerhult has been a creative meeting between the architect’s ideas and human centred lighting design. The Twister family’s design doesn’t give away anything about its high tech properties: True to Fagerhult’s philosophy it has state of the art lighting quality and is packed with contemporary solutions for lighting control.
”It felt really good working with people that know lighting technology and how to solve all the details. As we didn’t want to compromise on size and shape it took some serious engineering skills. I’ve learned a lot about lighting technology through this collaboration”, says Jani who is happy to announce that his design will be set into mass production.