HOOO!!! & HAAA!!! BY PHILIPPE STARCK IN COLLABORATION WITH JENNY HOLZER AND BACCARAT FOR FLOS, APRIL 2009

Flos presented this stunning collaborative project during the Milan Salone 2009 which involved no less than 5 well known contributors: design by Philippe Starck, text by Jenny Holzer, execution by Flos, crystal by Baccarat and custom electronic design by Moritz Waldemeyer. There are two versions of the lamp, a floor standing tall design and a smaller table top light. Each features a white LED display running along the centre line of the crystal element. The interplay between the geometric LED matrix and hand made Baccarat crystal turns Jenny Holzer's text into a mesmerizing animation.

The invitation to the launch dinner will go into history as the technically most advanced and most elaborate invitation ever. Each guest was sent a small box containing a mirrored cube. Inside this cube was a tiny LED matrix display that scrolled the text of the invitation including the date and location.

Included was also a small tool to switch the cube on and to access the battery, should it need to be changed in the future.

At the dinner the guests received the catalogue which had a cut out in which the cube fitted and where it was held in place by 4 invisible magnets.

The circuit contained in the cube is the most sophisticated piece of electronic design required by any of our projects so far. It contains about 100 LEDs, a processor, on/off switch and a battery to produce a fully functional text display on a board of 25mm by 25mm in size. To fit all components in an aesthetically pleasing layout required many days of manual optimisation and the first working prototype was soldered by hand to test the design.