A vertical crack of light between two rock walls

Lithos family · Juno and Vesta

The inside of the stone

Two uncarved rocks, hollowed out and lit from within. What you see is not the surface of the stone: it is what is inside it.

The light comes in through a gap

The inside of a geode: sheets of translucent gypsum stacked on one another

Where it comes from

This is where we learned not to carve

A geode is a closed stone that is full of crystal inside. Nobody designed it: it is water carrying salts that seeped into a hollow, evaporated over thousands of years and left one sheet behind another until it was full.

What we took from that is not the shape but the order of things: the good part of a stone is inside, it cannot be seen from outside, and no hand made it. Setting about carving it to look handsome is starting from the wrong end.

That is why Juno and Vesta are not carved. The stone is chosen, hollowed out just enough to fit the light, and hung. The shape it arrives with is the shape it keeps, and the whole job consists of not spoiling what was already made.

Juno

The one that used to be the seabed

Juno’s rock has shells inside it. They are not glued on: they were trapped when that stone was still the seabed, and they came into view when it was cut. Lit from behind you can see them, like a fossil inside a lamp.

See Juno · 188,95 € Original price was: 188,95 €.151,16 €Current price is: 151,16 €.

Vesta

Raw alabaster

Unpolished alabaster, the most translucent stone we work with. The light does not stay on the surface: it goes in, spreads, and the whole block turns amber, with the veins drawn from inside.

See Vesta · 208,04 € Original price was: 208,04 €.166,43 €Current price is: 166,43 €.

No two are alike, and that is not a figure of speech

These two pieces are not manufactured: they are chosen. Every rock brings its own size, colour and shape, which is why the measurements are approximate. The photograph shows a piece that has already been sold; yours will be similar, but it will not be that one.

Up close

Nobody made this

Juno’s shells, on the surface of the rock — Sea rock. The hollows are shells that stayed inside when this was the seabed.

Unpolished alabaster seen up close — Raw alabaster, switched off. Dirty white, matt, closed: it promises nothing.

The same alabaster lit, its veins glowing from within — The same piece with the light inside. The veins are not painted on: they show because the stone lets light through.

Two Vesta pendants lit above the counter of a whitewashed bar

A Juno pendant lit above a bar counter at nightfall — The shape was already made.

A Vesta pendant lit in a living room, the stone glowing amber

The specifications

Vesta: Approx. 20 cm high × 14 cm wide · raw natural alabaster
Juno: Sea rock with embedded shells · size depends on the block
Light: E14 lampholder with LED bulb included
Cord: Fabric, 100 cm or made to measure
Canopy: Round, black or white

Do you like it?

See the pieces How it is made