You’d be hard-pressed to find a designer or design enthusiast who hasn’t heard of Louis Poulsen – and with good reason! There are many explanations for their notoriety, including: imagination, experimentation and leadership.

In 1924 Poul Henningsen created his wildly influential Paris Lamp for Louis Poulsen, and the origin of how we still design to shape light can be directly traced back to his views on the dualities of design and illumination. Not bad for a 143-year-old design house!

It all began in 1874 with the eponymous Louis Poulsen, a Danish lighting manufacturer born out of the Scandinavian design tradition where form follows function. The function and design of their products have always been tailored to reflect and support the rhythm of natural light. Every detail in the design has a purpose. Every design starts and ends with light.

Since its inception, Louis Poulsen has cultivated exceptional feats in lighting design from some of the world’s greatest designer thinkers including: Poul Henningsen, Arne Jacobsen, Verner Panton, Øivind Slaatto, Alfred Homann, Oki Sato and Louise Campbell. Having established themselves as one of the key global suppliers of architectural and decorative lighting, Louis Poulsen and their enviable club of leading designers, continue to defy traditional product categories and typologies to serve and span the professional and private lighting markets for both indoor and outdoor applications.

Though the brand’s iconic classics remain as key staples in the design community, Louis Poulsen continues to invest heavily in new design collaborations and a more contemporary creative identity. This can be seen in product collaborations with GamFratesi for Yuh, Nendo for NJP and Mads Odgård for Above.

Maintaining their approach to lighting with a very strict and uncompromising product philosophy based on function, comfort and ambience, Louis Poulsen continues to revolutionize while staying true to their origins and legacy.

The functional aspect of any fixture for instance – the quality of the light itself – has to be resolved before addressing the shape and beauty of the lamp’s form. This philosophy continues to this day guiding the product design with a focus on human wellbeing and perception of artificial light to create unique lighting environments.

As a result, Louis Poulsen lighting is stylistically both simple and refined, and blends seamlessly into most interior designs, modern and classic alike – available in Australia through Cult.