ANTA Nola:
The early days of LED adoption

A creative approach to circumvent several issues associated with early LED technology

 

During the period from 2005 to 2010 the LED slowly started emerging as a serious alternative to other light sources. Its efficiency was surpassing the one of incandescent and fluorescent lamps and became on par with metal halide discharge lamps. Simultaneously, the LED already was superior when it comes to switching behaviour and the size of the light source. Nevertheless, it also had serious drawbacks: cost was still very high, the LEDs required substantial heat sinks, the extreme luminous density of the LED chip could cause eye damage when improperly placed and there were just no LEDs available that would provide a very low colour temperature comparable with dimmed incandescent bulbs.

In 2007 I designed the “Nola” pendant lamp, while still studying at the University of the Arts in Berlin. In a collaborative project with a traditional manual metal spinning workshop in Berlin Neukölln, I attempt to solve several issues connected to the LED technology. The light fixture, completely made out of sheet aluminium, would act as a natural heat sink for the high-power LEDs. Glare is effectively prevented by hiding the light sources from view and having them indirectly illuminate the table through a golden anodized reflector, that also changes the light colour to a 2200 K colour temperature; similar to dimmed tungsten lamps or candlelight.
“Nola” was then further refined in cooperation with Anta Leuchten from Hamburg and a second colour version in white and silver was added. The lamp was presented at the Light+Building 2008 and is still in production today.

 

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Photography: Rudolf Schmutz

© ANTA Leuchten GmbH