Grazer Detail at Stone Wall
I'm gearing up for Blog Tour London this week. In that spirit, I started to look at some of the unbelievable sponsors we have this year and I came across the amazing Lapicida. For those who don't know, Lapicida creates stunning floors, mosaics, tubs, and various other pieces of furniture all from natural stone. Their pieces are absolutely stunning, from Alabaster vases to complete stone tubs to mosaic walls. Each and every page of their gallery is nothing short of jaw-dropping.
Perspective Sketch, Grazed wall on right hand side.
Seeing all of this stone work, of course, got me thinking about how I would light some of their amazing pieces. The first piece I looked at is a simple stone wall. This kind of feature calls for a wall grazing solution. As you can see in my series of sketches on the right, the key to any good grazer detail is control of the lighting optic. A nice tight 10 degree beam that creates a curtain of light will bring out of the natural texture in the stone. It's important not to over light a natural surface like this stone. Texture comes from just the right amount of light. The idea here isn't to blow out the wall and make it super bright, but rather highlight the details.
The next piece I thought I tackle was their stunning Limestone egg bath. I cannot think of any tub more amazing, but how to light it? I opted to repeat the grazer concept but with a two-tone twist. First, a downlight grazer would gently light the curved wall behind the tub, but in this case subtlety is absolutely key. Frosted lens meant to diffuse the narrow beam will bring out the feather light highlights in the stone wall.
For the tub itself, I'd opt for a similar detail in reverse. A trench in the floor surrounding the base of the tub would allow for an uplight effect over the outer wall of the tub. With a little blocking and adjusting the light would tilted until the light scraped the outer edge of the tub gently illuminating the entire basin. Dimmable segments of light would allow me to program the lights so I can create natural shadows. The basin would have a bright and less bright side highlighting it's magnificent shape. Natural materials in natural shapes lend themselves to lighting that recalls realistic shadows.
Lighting Trench Shown at the base of the tub.
Section and Plan sketch for tub lighting.
Alabaster Vase lighting imagined as part of a mantle.
The last object in the collection that I decided to tackle was a simple Alabaster vase. These beautiful pieces of stone work don't require much by way of fancy lighting. The main trick is make sure they are lit strongly one from side with an accent light. This will create natural shapes that remind the viewer of the depth and texture of the piece. Alabaster is particularly amazing to do this with because it has a light translucency. So the light striking it from one side will bleed through to the dark side creating an amazing rich piece.
As part of Blog Tour I'll be having tea in the Lapicida showroom. I cannot wait to get a look at their pieces up close with my fellow BlogTour cohorts.