Andrea Claire Studio Presents Monumental Lighting Installation 'Totemic' at Milan Design Week 2026

Andrea Claire Studio unveiled 'Totemic,' a large-scale sculptural lighting installation at Alcova during Milan Design Week 2026. The work explores ornamentation rituals and light's capacity to become a meaningful structure. It consists of three stacked shade forms named 'Moon,' 'August,' and 'Sage,' each representing specific qualities: constancy and romance, wisdom and gravity, and accumulated knowledge, respectively. These elements are vertically arranged on brass structures finished with gold and silver leaf. The shades are handcrafted in the studio's Los Angeles workshop using hanji, a traditional Korean mulberry paper, applied to create marble-like textures that diffuse light softly. For its Milan presentation, the installation was significantly enlarged, with forms reaching up to 4 meters in height, creating an illusion of floating shapes. New materials include fused glass components and additional metallic finishes like 22-karat gold leaf, sterling silver leaf, and lunar gold leaf. The expanded version also incorporates a sculptural totem with a cast glass table in pink and amber tones designed to project colored light onto the floor. Glass artist Matthew Day Perez collaborated on the fused glass elements, adding warm, vibrant hues. Designer Andrea Claire describes lighting as 'jewelry for a room' and aimed to make that gesture architectural with this project. The work draws inspiration from her early experiments during a residency at the Chinati Foundation in Marfa, Texas, where she began treating light as a sculptural medium. The installation demonstrates how light can define space and atmosphere, merging craftsmanship, design, and architecture.