Andrijan Mueller of Switzerland admits that he is a little obsessed with honeycomb patterns. He fights boredom by doodling isometric cubes (the shape itself is just a hexagon with three additional lines). So he combined his love of tessellating patterns with his background in electrical engineering to make this stunning lighting fixture.
The light fixture is made of 30 modular pieces (of course he could always add more in the future). Each modular piece includes a 36mm LED light diffused by a molded acrylic dome, two pieces of water cut aluminum. LED color is controlled by an Arduino Uno.
Noticeably, the lights are daisy-chained together with sleeved cables. Rather than hiding these connections, they become part of the design. This was done in part to keep the electrical connections simple and to add another visual element. Andrijan explains:
The electric connection of the modules was in fact the biggest problem. The basic design of the lamp is quite straightforward with two aluminum layers and the acrylic domes in between. I thought a lot about how to implement the electric contacts between the modules. First I wanted very thin and flexible silicon cables hidden behind the sheet. While I compiled a PC for my brother I started learning new things about paracord cable sleeving. Finally I decided to connect the LED modules as simple as possible to a solid plug using thick copper cables. The black cable connections add a compelling visual effect by adding contrast to the strict geometric pattern.
Prototyping also played a key role in the design process. Since he was getting custom parts made it was really important to him to identify potential issues before ordering the actual materials.
In the end, it turned out great. If he were to do this project again, the only thing Andrijan would do differently would be to do it faster.
[via Reddit]
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