Propellor Bloom Pendant 1500
Propeller Bloom, a 1500mm wide show stopping feature piece is the latest addition to the Propeller Light range. The light commands presence and is designed and destined to occupy high ceilinged rooms and architectural void spaces. 8 petal-inspired Tasmanian Eucalypt blades slot into a custom made black anodised aluminium central disk, gently curving out and down around a single central bulb, with a large hand-turned blackwood nose cone completing the Propellor Bloom.
This feature light was made in response to a client’s brief; they liked the Propeller Pendant light form and light effect; both the open (500 mm diameter) and the Propeller Blossom (830 mm diameter) but they wanted a bigger light with more presence to fit within a large architectural space. The challenge was to maintain the lightness in form and the independent structure, where each blade only connects into the central disk and not to one another.
The original Propellor, a union of a propellor and a flower, came about through experimentation with plywood modelling, and orienting the grain in a certain way created the form that is found throughout the Propellor range.
Bio I am a lighting and furniture Designer/Maker based in Tasmania, Australia. Much of my work is inspired by the natural environment. Concentration on overall form, rather than intense detailing, with an interest in how light performs through and around these forms and materials, is of interest to me. This light emanating from the periphery reflects the alternative sensory world in which I design, being legally blind with less than 5% vision.
I try to avoid quick moving trends in my work, but instead focus on designing and making things to stand the test of time, both metaphoricaly and physicaly
Other prizes In 2010, early in Duncan’s career, he was the recipient of the Designed Objects Tasmania Springboard Scholarship and has since been a finalist in many of the Australian design industry's top awards and beyond. This includes The Edge Green Award in 2014 (Winner – Sydney), the Bombay Sapphire Design Discover Award 2011 (Finalist – Sydney), Ministers Youth Arts Award in 2011 (winner- Tasmania) and the LAMP Award in 2014 (2nd place – Canada). As a small scale designer/maker/practitioner, winning the London-based architectural lighting design Darc Award for Best Floor light of 2018 is one of Duncan’s crowning achievements. He competed against many international design firms to win the accolade, which was selected by over 6000 industry peers (lighting designers, interior designers and architects). Duncan was invited in 2017 and 2019 to show his work at Euroluce biennial International Lighting Exhibition at Salone del Mobile in Milan – the world's largest decorative lighting trade exposition, and was also shown at Venice Design 2018, part of the Venice Biennale. As a partially blind (less than 5% vision) visual artist and designer, Duncan appeared at the Powerhouse Museum during the Sydney Design Festival providing the Alternative Sensory World Keynote in March 2019. His achievements as a vision impaired creative practising in a visually dominated field have been recognised by him winning the Tasmanian Community Achievement Award in 2014 for Disability Achievement, and an Australian Aspire Award for Disability and Small Business in 2020. In July 2019 and Ausgust 2022, Duncan was a guest teaching fellow at the Bartlett Architecture School at University College London, teaching design making as a world-leading vision impaired practitioner. Duncan is a long term board member of Designed Objects Tasmania SIT honourable mention 2021/2022 - Stump light Duncan was selected to exhibit at 'Vivid Sydney' in 2023 with a large interactive installation called 'Light Forest'.
