Incollect Magazine - Issue 15

Incollect Magazine 75 reshaped the experience of architectural space. Seen today, it is easy to forget how radical these objects once appeared. Nason rejected the elaborate ornament traditionally associated with Murano in favor of layered geometries, softened silhouettes, and modular compositions that reflected the technological optimism of the postwar decades. His experimentation extended well beyond form. He developed new approaches to blowing, casting, and coloring glass, while refining his own distinctive version of the pulegoso finish. This softly opalescent, bubble-filled surface gave his lamps extraordinary depth and luminosity. Unlike some designers who supplied drawings to manufacturers and awaited their creation, Nason remained intimately involved in every stage of production. He supervised work at the furnace, designed bespoke chrome- plated fittings and structural components, and readily embraced emerging technologies, incorporating innovations such as line-operated foot switches into his lighting decades before they became commonplace. This meticulous attention to detail allowed him to reconcile traditional craftsmanship with the industrial precision that defined modern Italian design. His achievements were equally the product of collaboration. Every lamp emerged through close partnerships with Murano’s master glassblowers, whose technical virtuosity enabled Nason’s increasingly ambitious ideas to take shape. Although he worked with several distinguished manufacturers — including Vetreria Vistosi and, later, Linea GB Milano — it was his long association with A.V. Mazzega, beginning in the early 1960s, that proved decisive. There he enjoyed an unusual degree of creative freedom, developing the layered glass constructions that became his signature and established him as one of Murano’s most original modernists. No design better encapsulates that achievement than the Lotus table lamp. Widely regarded as one of the icons of twentieth-century Italian lighting, it demonstrates Nason’s mastery of combining translucent and opaque glass to orchestrate the movement of light. Four petal-like shades surround a concealed light source, their overlapping forms producing a delicate layered effect that dissolves the boundary between object and illumination. “Carlo Nason’s inventive use of stacked and layered construction makes him a truly original and outstanding figure in the world of Murano glassmaking,” says Stanislas Reboul, the French design dealer and specialist in 1970s Italian glass. Among the works Reboul most admires are the Lotus and the remarkable ‘Sfumato’ tubular floor lamp assembled from stacked vessel-like forms. As the column rises, translucent glass gradually gives way to opacity, creating a softly diffused vertical Designed in 1969, Carlo Nason’s LS 144 for Mazzega in opaque lattimo Murano glass and iridescent Murano glass was originally conceived as a ceiling light, although it is also often used as a table lamp. Three handblown forms stack within a nickel-plated steel base, tapering into an elongated drop. In natural light, it has a cool, milky sheen; when lit, the smallest form glows warm, opaque light, passing along the length of two layers with varied transparencies. Available from Domus Aurea on Incollect.com. The LT 353 Egg table lamp and integrated vase. Built from three handblown Murano glass sections, the top and bottom are clear, with a middle section of transparent crystal and lattimo (white) spiral filigrana glass. Designed for Mazzega, circa 1970s. Available from Stanislas Reboul on Incollect.com. Photo courtesy of Stanislas Reboul.