‘ليت — Late’ is a bespoke 3D Printed lamp designed for a friend of MEAN and is not intended for mass production. The unique piece is a thoughtful and innovative experiment in creating lighting fixtures using Robotic 3D printing.
‘ليت — Late’ is designed keeping in mind the essence of the Industrial FDM Robotic 3D printing process and takes full advantage of its resourcefulness, robustness, and formal possibilities.
Manufactured in collaboration with Nagami in Avila, Polymer Pellets of 3 colors were used to print the lamp: Maroon Brown, Tangerine Orange, and Clear. The pellets are carefully distributed during the 3D printing process to ensure a smooth transition gradient from the dark color to the transparent. This process had to be prototyped and repeated several times to obtain optimal results.
An industrial LED rod lighting fixture emits light equally in a straight line. The design of the conical lampshade form covers the bottom part of the LED with a broader base, which narrows to a smaller diameter, encasing the lamp at the top. The design of the gradient colors conceals the bottom part of the lighting fixture and diffuses towards the top in a smooth transition. The result is a shooting star effect, which elegantly heightens the elongated proportions of the lamp.
In plan, the form is also achieved by rotating and reducing the scale of hexagons incrementally towards the top. The rotating and overlapping hexagons are generated using a Python script and provide an outline shape used as the layered pathway curves for 3D printing. The resulting form is a phyllotaxis geometry in the plan - a geometric phenomenon typically found in nature. In elevation, a Diagrid lattice is generated by the corners of the hexagons, adding articulation and structural support to the lampshade shell.
‘ليت — Late’ is an experiment in light, materiality, computation, geometry, and form. The name comes from the fact that this experiment took a long time to design, prototype, and finals hence our lateness in delivering it.
‘ليت — Late’ in Emirati dialect also is an informal word for ‘Light.’