Across the project’s development, Bleat founder Tristin Norwell became a familiar face in the Retrouvius shop and has incorporated salvaged, reclaimed, vintage and sustainable materials throughout the studio’s multifunctional editing rooms. Earlier this month he gave us the grand tour.
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By chance Retrouvius found a third generation stone mason in Northamptonshire with a small yard containing many decades worth of material remnants.
The old family company, founded in 1939, has reached the end of the line as there is no apprentice to replace the one man operation.
An accumulation of "worthless scrap" was facing the prospect of a burial by landfill.
Retrouvius saw the value in this waste material resource.
Our first collaboration with the stone mason was to produce lamp bases from off cut pieces of Derbyshire fossil limestone.
We were already familiar with the qualities of this stone and its rich crinoid fossil content, having rescued many tonnes from the concourse flooring of Sir Frederick Gibberd's Heathrow Terminal 2 in 2014.
We leapt at the opportunity to work with the remnants of this indigenous quarry.
Our next set of eighteen lamp bases are made using a wide variety of stones from the mason's scrap.
Serendipity informs the design. The lexicon of the stone mason and the Retrouvius philosophy of re-use marry to cast a new light on these small "waste" fragments which would otherwise be consigned to the skip.
Each lamp is unique and offered for sale wired to UK BC standard.
With thanks to Kim Lightbody for photography
