Design
Bec Brittain’s parachutes
From NYC’s Emma Scully Gallery exhibition, “Paraciphers.”
Image courtesy of: Design Milk, photographed by: Brooke Holm
Ever since Bec Brittain burst onto the scene over a decade ago, she has been a sensation. The female designer believes that she is successful because she has remained perpetually drawn to both design and its belief system. Brittain’s route however took a bit of a circumventive route… Brittain studied product design at Parsons University and followed that with Philosophy at NYU. To conclude her formal education, Brittain received a degree in architecture from London’s Architectural Association.
Brittain’s first job was for an architectural firm; however soon enough, she realized that she most enjoyed designing and producing high-end and high-quality door hardware. Drawn to small scale production, in 2008 Brittain became the Design Director for Lindsay Adelman’s acclaimed lighting brand.
“SHY 17″ light fixture
Dimensions are: 38″ x 18″ x 17” (height)
Image courtesy of: Bec Brittain
In 2011, Brittain founded her studio in Brooklyn; the firm instantly became known for its adaptive use of innovative production, luxury design, and spot-on precision. Specifically, Brittain’s first piece, the SHY fixture, debuted to instant acclaim. Very quickly, the designer became known for her (courtesy of 1st Dibs) “large-scale, space-defining lighting systems that she and her team assemble in-house from locally crafted components.”
With most of her collections, geometry plays a big part. Brittain has proven herself to be masterful in designing system-based structures that are produced via a number of techniques and a wide-reaching network of local artisans and trusted fabricators. Each and every piece is hand-assembled under Brittain’s watchful eye.
Brittain sitting in front of “Mercury,” a large-scale installation that was presented at Patrick Parrish Gallery in 2015. About the project, the designer told Interior Design, “Mercury is a very personal and evocative piece for me, and I wanted to tell more of a story around it. It grew out of wanting to work with more sensual materials and making something more handcrafted. The piece as a whole creates an architectural statement that is also warm and welcoming.”
The figure is held together by 35 strands of suede affixed with LED tubes, agate beads, and jasper.
Image courtesy of: Interior Design, photographed by: Lauren Coleman
Brittain’s designs are each a product of her personal ideas rather than following market trends. She explains it best here, “With architecture, you have to let go of a layer of detail at some point because you have subcontractors. I like the fact that I can be more obsessive with detail on this scale. It’s more pragmatic. If you were that obsessive with architecture, you would never get anything built.”
As with her SHY fixtures, many of Brittain’s designs employ LED tubes to create disjointed, faceted forms. Fully customizable, the materials include mirrored glass, and the patterning highlights the juxtaposition between light and shadow. In addition, the effects created change according to whether the product is turned on or off.
The collection’s pieces are called “Angela I,” “Florence I,” “James I,” “Julius I and Julius 2,” “Malcolm I,” “Martin 2,” and “Unknown Author I.”
Image courtesy of: Design Milk, photographed by: Brooke Holm
It was Brittain’s 2022 debut that caused a lot of sensation due to its absolute originality. “Paraciphers” is a collection of floor lamps that derives its formal and material inspiration from NASA parachuting arm. The geometric textile patterns encrypt (courtesy of The New York Times) “messages of social justice in a mid-19th-century telegraphic code, interpreted through color.”
The pieces were created for Brittain’s first exhibition in two years… as the pandemic put a virtual stop to shows in early 2020. The designer says that she was inspired by the ongoing movement of inflated parachutes and from her love of NASA’s wind-tunnel parachute testing division. With this collection, patterning proved especially paramount. Brittain confirms that she worked incessantly to replicate moments of “light preserved in time.”
An up-close detail…
Image courtesy of: Stir Pad
There is no doubt that parachutes and hot-air balloons inspire a sense of awe. Seeing a hot-air balloon drifting elegantly and effortlessly through the sky tends to bring forth a feeling of wonderment. Specifically from Brittain, “I have sketches from eleven years ago, from the first time I saw photos of Mars-rover parachute tests in a huge wind tunnel for NASA. The way they were illuminated and the way the strings made forms were just beautiful.” The progression from Brittain’s early sketches to formation took eleven long years. She explains, Every time I came back to my sketches of the inflated parachutes used by NASA, they just ended up looking like run-of-the-mill lanterns and the idea sat in the depths of my sketchbooks. A lot has changed over the past eleven years. I realised I didn’t need to turn them into a producible, designed lighting collection. I just finally had the confidence to let parachutes be parachutes.” For that, we are so glad!
