LIGHTING THE WAY

Designer MICHAEL ANASTASSIADES shares about his creative process, his partnership with world-renowned Italian lighting company, Flos and why everything he puts out is 100 per cent authentic.

- CHARMAINE CHAN

“Try to keep technology out,” says Michael Anastassiades, when talking about his creative process. “I don’t want to be limited by what it can offer me, because I think it would cancel out a lot of my ideas.”

It’s a refreshing opinion to put forth in an age of artificial intelligence, when many conversations are centering on the limitless potential of technology. Then again, the Cypriot designer is unabashedly old-school when it comes to his craft, both in technique and material. “I like honesty in materials – I don’t want plastics to look like wood or metal. Things need to look and feel like what they are.”

“Unfortunately, we live in a culture which is encouraging us to distance ourselves from reality,” he says. “Everything is about the image in social media – everybody wants to be photographed next to something that makes them look good, and it’s not about the product anymore. But I’m interested in the product. I’m interested in creating something that you will live with for a long time.”

AN UNCOMPROMISING VISION

No doubt, this is part of the reason that Anastassiades has become as successful as he has in the field of design. His expectation that things should work, work well, and last a long time can arguably be traced back to his education – he moved from Cyprus to the UK to study civil engineering at London’s Imperial College, before going on to do Industrial Design at the Royal College of Art.