There are some excellent designers to be found at the New Designers’ show. Already going for 24 years, London’s New Designers collects some of the best design work from UK students. Representing nine categories, the exhibit covers anything from “furniture to fashion, graphics to glass.” Over 18,000 visitors will see what’s brewing in Britain. One of the exhibitors in 2009 is Anna Hadwick of Nottingham Trent University. Her Studio Mini Lamp strives to embody a “use me how you will approach.”

Studio Mini Lamp. Designed by Anna Hadwick.

Its fetching nature stems from the perceptibility of its construction. This transparent little desk lamp announces its own functionality: one might expect to turn it over and find a blueprint still attached! Composed of three legs, the Studio Mini is a desk lamp made in oak with a porcelain head and a red, fabric-coated cable. The three legs provide “stability whilst allowing surface area to be maximised.” But it is the Studio Mini’s head that steals so much attention away. Rotatable and detachable, the head encourages “intuitive interaction” with its “simple twist and pull movement”: “Inspired by the action of changing a light bulb, the lamp communicates its functionality directly to its user.”

Since it’s made of porcelain, the lamp’s head also generates irony by giving a pliable feel to a material associated with hardness, if not utter immotility. The arm pivots 180 degrees, thereby casting light into changeable arrays dependent on your projection needs. Head and legs are indeed attractive, but the cord on Hadwick’s Studio Mini puts my heart to fluttering. Much like the Spaghetti Chandelier, the colorful cabling snakes its way through the piece like some errant vein of blood.