Design Icons - Flos Arco Floor Lamp By Fratelli Castiglioni

 

Designed in 1962 by brothers Achille and Per Giacomo Castiglioni for Flos, the Arco lamp performs its function with the minimum of adornment, yet looks and feels like a modern, up to date product even today. Its has been much copied, but remains available today and fills its function as well now as it did when it was first designed.

The Castiglioni’s identified a problem which the addresses elegantly and completely. A pendant light hung in your lounge is useful only when the light it throws is where it is needed - over the coffee table or a particular chair. But what if you want to re-arrange the room and change the location of that need?

A pendant light is not easily moved. Regular lamps have trailing cables which look terrible and become a trip hazard. The Arco solves that problem by throwing a light source three metres away from the base. Which means it can be at or close to a wall, cable hidden, whilst the lamp is positioned where it is most useful. If you want to move the furniture around in your room, the marble base has a strategically positioned hole to allow it to be lifted and easily moved to a new location.

Great design is timeless and the Flos Arco lamp looks as right in a modern minimalist apartment as it did in the swinging sixties or the excesses of the seventies and eighties.

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