marten Herma Anderson draws from childhood experiments
Architectural designer and furniture designer Marten Herma Anderson presents a new candy line light bulbs that translate a childhood memory into a tactile lighting object. The project is driven by a moment he remembers as “a childhood memory of melted candy in a lamp-lamp,which eventually expanded into a small family of lamps. What began as a playful accident has developed into a focused study of material.
Anderson describes a long-standing fascination with “translucent color — ice cream wrappers, gummy bears, the way light moves through something that was never meant to shine.Using resin, he suspends melted pigments to echo the soft collapse of caramel under the warmth. The shades appear fluid and spontaneous as they float around the lamp.
image © Ragnar Schmuck
liquid lamps made from molten pigments
Each of Marten Herma Anderson’s lamps combines fiberglass shades with raw, waxed ceramic bases. This material palette offers a clear conversation between softness and structure. The shades bear traces of their manufacture: fine mesh imprints, tiny air bubbles and fine red stitching that erases the perimeter. These details give the objects a sense of immediacy, as if they were quickly formed and left in place.
Below, ceramic bases ground the composition, as their soft, earthy tone contrasts with the bright upper forms. The ratio between base and shade keeps the lamp balanced and allows the expressive resin to remain in focus.
image © Ragnar Schmuck
experimenting with materials for a glamorous atmosphere
Once lit, the candy bulbs shift from object to atmosphere as the color diffuses into the resin. Some areas glow softly while others remain dense. The light activates the built-in forms, displaying small details that remain subtle when the lamp is off.
Anderson frames the work as an extension of personal habits and memories. ‘Everyone around me knows that I love candies: not only the taste, but the translucent colors,,” he notes, recalling how he once placed a sticky bat on a bulb, watching it melt. That early experiment finds a new form here, refined through hardware control and scaled into a series. While the lamps retain this sense of play, they show a clear understanding of construction.
image © Ragnar Schmuck
image © Ragnar Schmuck
image courtesy of the artist
