Press Release
Caterina Moretti Receives the Silver A' Design Award for Barro Lamp in Lighting Products and Fixtures Design
The international grand jury of the 2022 - 2023 A' Design Award & Competition recognizes Caterina Moretti for lighting products and fixtures design
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COMO, Italy, April 20, 2023 /DesignNewswire/ Barro Lamp by Caterina Moretti, designed for Graypants, has been granted the Silver A' Design Award in the Lighting Products and Fixtures Design category, A' Design Award & Competition has announced. The award was conferred within the 2022 - 2023 A' Design Award & Competition and was decided through blind peer review by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members, who scored anonymized entries against predetermined criteria.
The Silver A' Design Award Explained
The Silver A' Design Award celebrates top-tier designs that embody excellence and innovation. This award acknowledges creations that are not only aesthetically pleasing but also highly functional, reflecting the designer's deep understanding and skill. Silver A' Design Award recipients are recognized for their contribution to raising industry standards and advancing the practice of design. Their work often incorporates original innovations and elicits a strong emotional response, making a notable impact on the improvement of everyday life.
About Barro Lamp
Barro Lamp captures the warmth of nature in a composition of clay and glass. This pendant lamp is made of two elements where the Mexican city of Oaxaca is the main character. Molded by San Bartolo Coyotepec craftspeople who have mastered Barro Negro since pre-Columbian times; a blown-glass dome covers the clay structure: symbolic protection guarding precious objects. Barro lamp is available in two versions: red clay and transparent shade and black clay with a gray shade.
About Caterina Moretti
Caterina has the ability to focus her vision on the tiniest details of her furniture, accessories and interior design projects, while simultaneously looking to the horizon to direct her design studio. As a designer, her inspiration is in nature, in raw materials that offer multiple possibilities of shapes and textures, and in their ability to be transformed into everyday objects. Her passion for texture and contrast has translated into a range of objects that infuse the organic and subtle with an original point of view, always provoking a contemplative twist.
Award Record
Caterina Moretti is a winner of 1 A' Design Award, including this recognition.
About the A' Lighting Products and Fixtures Design Award
The A' Lighting Design Award is an international lighting design competition recognizing good lighting designs by best lighting designers and brands worldwide. It is organized within the A' Design Award & Competition and is open to lighting designers, lighting architects, industrial design studios and lighting product manufacturers from all countries. Typical entries include chandeliers, pendant lights, wall sconces, table lamps, floor lamps and outdoor lights. The awarded lighting designs are published at https://dezigners.org/design-category/lighting
About A' Design Award & Competition
Organized annually since 2008, A' Design Award & Competition is an international, juried design accolade. The competition is open to entries from all countries. The philanthropic mission of the A' Design Award is to advance society through good design, by recognizing and promoting superior products, projects and services that benefit society, and by creating a global awareness and appreciation for good design practices and principles. Nominations are peer reviewed and evaluated anonymously by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members against predetermined criteria such as functionality, ergonomics, engineering, presentation, innovation, usability, sustainability and technology, with score normalization applied to remove biases. Awards are conferred at Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron levels. Eligible laureates receive the A' Design Prize, which includes the award trophy, the certificate of design excellence, the hardcover yearbook, a lifetime license to use the A' Design Award winner logo, exhibition of awarded works, an invitation to the gala night and award ceremony in Italy, inclusion in the World Design Rankings and Designer Rankings, and public relations and publicity services. Registration, uploading a work and receiving a preliminary score are free of charge, and Professional and Digital Edition laureates are not contractually obliged to pay further fees to claim the A' Design Prize. More information is available at https://competition.adesignaward.com
Press Resources
- Winner Page: https://dezigners.org/142624
- A' Design Award Page: https://competition.adesignaward.com/142624
- Media Showcase: https://www.designnewsroom.com/!142624
- Laureate Profile: https://dezigners.org/d/332697
- Further Information from the Laureate: https://graypants.com/
Media Contact
Giulia Ferrari, Press Office
Designers.Org
Via Leone Leoni 32, 22100 Como, Italy
press@designers.org
+39 031 4491953
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Fact Sheet
The Work
- Project
- Barro Lamp
- Function
- Lamp
- Category
- Lighting Products and Fixtures Design
- Discipline
- Industrial Design
- Industry
- Furniture & Home and Electronics & Appliances
- Colors
- Black, Silver, Dark Slate Gray, Gainsboro and Dark Gray
- Images
- 5
- Client
- Graypants
The Recognition
- Laureate
- Caterina Moretti
- Country
- Mexico
- Recognition
- Silver A' Design Award
- Edition
- 2022 - 2023
- Design ID
- #142624
Credits
- Team
- Caterina Moretti.
- Image Credits
- Design by Caterina Moretti for Graypants, Photo: Andrés Alejos.
Design Details
- Unique Properties
- Made from Oaxacan Barro Negro clay and blown glass, Barro Pendant Lamp is not only a meeting point of ancestral traditions and contemporary design, it is also an exploration where the limits of traditional materials and techniques are pushed and the clay’s essence is brought to a modern setting. The clean lines of the cylindrical clay structure are circled by a blown glass dome -a symbolic protection for precious objects- rendering a soft, filtered light. Barro pendant lamp is available in two versions: red with a transparent dome and charcoal with a smoke gray dome.
- Inspiration
- The city of Oaxaca, its beauty, culture, art, and tradition have inspired this lamp. Barro negro (Oaxacan Black clay) is admired throughout the world for its peculiar method of preparing and firing it. We love the richness of its satin-like feel and the small tell-tell signs of the fire marked on its sheen. We have found a local glass blower in the city whose work we love, so we married the two materials, playing with the elements of fire, earth, and air, where both clay and glass are born.
- Research
- This has been mostly an empiric project, since both components of the lamp are made by experts in a trade that has been passed along through many years –centuries in the case of the Black clay. Some of the methods have been explained to us and some shown but many of the details of the craftspeople’s work are made from experience and intuition and ingrained in their technique like second nature. We did several trials of materials but again, all the work was very intuitive.
- Challenge
- Since both components of the lamp are made by experts in trades passed along through many years –centuries in the case of Oaxacan Black clay, in general, Barro Lamp is a product of empirical knowledge and age-old technology. The methods have been tried and perfected through the craftspeople's work and learned from their experience and intuition, ingrained in their technique like second nature.
- Realization and Technology
- A clay cylindrical structure sits inside a glass-blown glass cylindrical dome that envelops and lends the lamp its main form. Oaxacan Black Clay is a technique dating back from Pre-Hispanic times and has withstood the passage of time, perfected through trial and error to create such perfect pieces we enjoy today. Only in the small community of San Pedro Coyotepec on the outskirts of Oaxaca City, this technique is mastered by sourcing local clay and hand-burnishing each piece before firing using a smooth stone in order to achieve its characteristic iridescent sheen and smooth feel.
- Operation and Interaction
- Barro was conceived as a pendant lamp. The height can be adjusted through the wiring, which is very basic in itself. The glass dome serves both as an encasing for the clay structure as well as a shade to soften the light.
- Project Duration and Location
- We started drafting for this project in July 2019 in Guadalajara, after a visit to Oaxaca to source another project. There, we visited the community of San Pedro Coyotepec and met the Amando family. We started prototyping in June 2020 and working on the glass dome in June 2020. The design was finished by March 2021
- Specifications
- Overall product dimensions are 165 mm in diameter x 350 mm in height.
- Keywords
- Lamp, clay lamp, pendant light, contemporary lighting, interior design, Mexican traditional techniques, hand-blown glass
