The iconic Bul-Bo lamp makes a comeback with a colourful body

The iconic Bul-Bo lamp designed by Gabetti and Isola Studio was recently re-edited by lighting design company Axolight, introducing contemporary elements with physiological regard for its original design. Bul-Bo is debuting today in a new soft and colorful version called Bul-Bo Soft owing to the collaboration with the Italian textile company Loro Piana.

Created between 1968 and 1971 to light the spaces of the Olivetti Residential Centre in Ivrea, Bul-Bo was conceived as a playful, hilarious and almost irreverent item. This is because of its faux leather base whose shape reminds of a bulb or an onion - as the architects themselves claim - filled inside with marble granules. It allows the stem to be tilted, allowing it to manoeuvre into different positions. At the top, there is an aluminium ‘flag’ with the silhouette of the original incandescent light bulb, now replaced by a LED source.

A brilliant object in its simplicity and deep contemporaneity that Axolight and Loro Piana chose to propose in an even more playful variant. The base of the lamp is covered in wool and cashmere Altai fabric in two different colours. The first variant has a natural color with contrasting warm red stitching; the second one has warm red color with tone-on-tone stitching. This is how the Bul-Bo Soft lamp was born, referring to one of the main features of the fabric in which it is made: softness. Bul-Bo Soft will be exclusively available in Loro Piana stores and Loro Piana Interiors showrooms. "After having given a second life to the original Bul-Bo with an outstanding partnership with Aimaro Isola, Guido Drocco, Lodovico Gabetti and Fabrizio Pellegrino, we really enjoyed working on this special edition of the lamp. All the distinctive elements of this unique object have been perfectly maintained while adding a tactile and colourful aspect and other small details that always aim at comfort and pleasure," says Giuseppe Scaturro, CEO, Axolight.

The functionality of the lamp has also remained unchanged, designed to guarantee perfect lighting for different uses, obtainable by changing the inclination of the rod - reading lamp, work lamp for the desk or light point similar to a suspension lamp and further improved by the possibility of positioning the LED source independently.