Since I was a child, I began devising "contraptions" - machines that made wind, transported marbles, or moved stones. Later, at the Faculty of Architecture, this manual dexterity found its outlet in model-making; day and night, I crafted scale models to give physical form to thoughts.
As an architect, I developed a deep love for structural architecture, specifically the work of Pier Luigi Nervi - a preeminent 20th-century engineer and builder. In his lessons, Nervi demonstrated how the curvature of a reinforced concrete bridge, based on static calculation, is infinitely more beautiful than an "arbitrary" curve because it corresponds to natural laws. He believed that building correctly was an ethical necessity before an aesthetic one, yet ultimately, the two were inseparable.
The idea that a form is born from "constraints" - reasons independent of trends, personal taste, or ego - fascinates me. It is a methodology I find as educational as it is, today, dramatically counter-current.
However, it is to Cesare Leonardi that I owe my move toward artisanal design - a way to engage with complex projects independently. In 2011, encouraged by Cesare, I conceived my first lamp. The idea came while "playing" with the plastic sheets I used for architectural models; it felt natural to imagine them luminous and to curve them, just as I was accustomed to doing with my hands.
Today, lighting is no longer about traditional bulbs, but tiny, formless LEDs. Light is becoming increasingly immaterial, taking the shape of the objects to which it is applied. It can even change form within our hands.
While the idea of "bending" light was fascinating, these early prototypes faced extreme technical difficulties: the bending and twisting of materials causing yielding or breakage; the stress transmitted to the LEDs potentially damaging them; and the curving of materials complicating the internal passage of electrical current - which must, necessarily, pass through somewhere.
Building artisanal "flexible light" lamps has been the challenge and the starting point of a project that, for twelve years, has intermittently fueled my imagination. It is an enthusiasm renewed by experimenting with new solutions and materials - such as wood, steel wire, ping-pong balls, or colored cardstock - and by the magic of seeing a new lamp light up for the very first time.
