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Scintilla was the first system of “naked” lamps
produced in Italy. My father, Livio, and I had already
designed and built a lighting system with naked
halogen bulbs in 1972. Gae was familiar with the
system because she had incorporated it into
some of her interiors, so as soon as she joined
FontanaArte she wanted to make it into a regular
product with all the tweaking that this required
in terms of engineering. When it came time to
choose a name, she remembered one of the first
demonstrations, when the bulb had exploded with
a loud bang and a lot of smoke, and so she said,
“Let’s call it Scintilla!!”
Since it was a lamp made of nothing, it integrated
perfectly into any type of setting. When it was
off, it disappeared. So it was much liked for all
these reasons, and we made many exemplars
for art galleries, exhibition venues, and historical
buildings.
Scintilla
Scintilla was the first system to use halogen
bulbs for room lighting. The bulbs sparkled like
the light of the sun, with the advantage of not
being blinding. This gave us the freedom to create
constellations of small bright suns suspended in
space. The invention consisted in fitting the lighting
system to the space, since we installed one or
more halogen bulbs in a room and then the walls
and ceiling reflected the light to illuminate the
entire space. The simplicity of structure made it
possible to place a number of bulbs along a cord
and custom build the system to suit the specific
needs of each space.
Piero Castiglioni
Il sistema Scintilla di Livio e Piero Castiglioni è adottato per il progetto dell’illuminazione
nell’allestimento di Gregotti Associati della mostra “La Carrozzeria Italiana”, Torino-Roma
(1977-1978). Stampa fotografica b/n, AVG.038
Scintilla
