Lausanne, Switzerland – Inspired by craftsmen who once used tortoise shell as a material for spectacle frames, recent ECAL grad Joséphine Choquet created a lamp that uses acetate to replicate the look of the precious – and now banned – material.
‘Glasses makers used to compare different kinds of tortoise shells under the light to find and reach the right colour and pattern they were looking for,’ she explains. ‘This luminous object aims to play with the modular elements to compare as the craftsmen did, to sculpt the light and the atmosphere according to your mood.’
The Copacabana lamp is both modern and retro, much like designs seen in our Neo Kitsch design direction. Choquet’s upgrade of a cheap material such as acetate, giving it the semblance of an expensive, rare one, is a perfectly Memphis Group move, combining highbrow and lowbrow concepts into one beautiful piece.