I made these lamps for Tomukun Korean Barbeque in Ann Arbor MI, while working on the design of the restaurant as part of OX Studio. The owner wanted to foster an urban atmosphere and tap into the traditional customs of eating barbeque, so I designed and fabricated these steel versions of paper lanterns for the restaurant. In all there are 50 lamps. The writing on most of the lamps is the name of the restaurant, while the other lamps show the names of people important to the owner.

The first prototype was rough, made on a plasma cutter at a local workshop (Maker-Works, in Ann Arbor), but the finished products were laser-cut mild steel. There is an inner layer of acrylic to diffuse the light, and a layer of steel on the outusde to provide the look and the contrast. Other than the physical laser-cutting of the steel (from my files), all work was done personally, from assembling the lighting sockets to treating the steel, partly at Maker-Works and the partly in my basement workshop.

Maker-Works: http://maker-works.com/wordpress/