THE NEW SCHOOL OF DESIGN  View All

A Q&A with Magnus Wästberg, Founder/Owner

What’s your design process?

Every product development project starts from a manifesto that we made for the company. It’s about an ethos on the product. It’s more holistic. Everything is valued equally. Normally when you look at lighting companies, you have those that are very technical or have very aesthetical values. In our design process, we really value these qualities equally and to do that we start a little bit backwards. It is very time consuming and very hard sometimes, but I think looking at the product and interacting with the product, I think you can understand there’s as much thought behind all dimensions.

Where have you found inspiration?

My father has been a lighting producer for many, many years in the technical field. When I started working with him, I saw this gap in the market. Some kind of lack of product that has a total holistic quality. So what I did was to really get into deep conversations with some designers and architects that I know, and to really work on a product that doesn’t come from either a form point of view or a technical point of view, but from a discussion of how we can make light better in all dimensions. It’s very easy to talk about LEDs or OLEDs and do things with them but often it’s not very meaningful. You do very spectacular things just because you can. There is not too much thought behind why.

What do you value in design?

Products should consume as little energy as possible. They should be as efficient as possible – energy, meaning how you use materials, production methods, efficient resources. The other one is that they should give as much light as possible, given the use of resource. Another one is the quality of the light. When it comes to the emotional side of it, the fixture should not only be a working tool, but how you can use the lamp in a way that makes a good atmosphere, it’s dimming, and the actual fixture would be nice to have in an environment from an aesthetical point of view.

What’s your favorite Wastberg design?

In a way I think it’s kind of hard to compare them. I see myself more like a curator. Like a gallery. If you walk into a gallery, you can be sure that this gallery has a certain type of quality and artists that are very different from each other. Our product is the same in that all these qualities are there but they look different from each other.

What does your home look like?

Me and my family (my wife and two daughters) live in a “typical” Swedish 1950s house with white walls, large windows and oak hearing-bone floors. The furniture is mostly Wegner, Kjearholm and Judd. We love books so the Dieter Rams shelving system is quite dominant in the living room. On the walls there are mostly contemporary Swedish art. Regarding the lighting there are no ceiling lamps. Only floor lamps and table lamps placed on horizontal surfaces all mixed with candles.