Following Glo-ball, Flos asked me to update a typology of light in their collection which had become dated. The resulting ‘O’ was conceived as a simple aluminium spinning for the body and a polycarbonate moulding for the shade. Products like this one may be ordinary, but they have a big impact on our environment as they are often used in public spaces, and creating an interface between design and architecture, they need not be overpoweringly expressive. In fact it may be the designer’s duty to suppress any instinctive desire for self-expression in favour of something more discreet.
Extract from Everything but the Walls by Jasper Morrison (Lars Müller Publishers, 2006)