If the over-arching concept of sustainability can be said to have a marquee component, it would surely be renewable energy, for what else makes a bigger impact than eschewing fossil fuels in favor of a clean, self-sustaining energy source? But the truth—as rightly apprehended by designer David Trubridge—is that the biggest bang for one’s environmental buck is to be found in transport. Just so, Trubridge’s Seed System facilitates flatpack shipping of some of the most glorious pendant lamps one has ever seen.

Seed System for Flatpack Shipping. Designed by David Trubridge.

The Seed System Reduces Freight Volume

Trubridge’s design practice has always been driven by sustainability. “We are continually doing all we can to reduce our environmental footprint,” he says, “reducing the volume of our freight has the most impact and is the best thing we can do.” The resultant kitset system requires but 1/40th of the volume of traditional packaging.

The savings gleaned on transport costs would be miracle enough, but the capper is the magnificent unveiling of Trubridge’s Seed System compatible designs. These four pendant lamps—Koura, Kina, Flax, and Hinaki—are each organically inspired designs that evoke a phenomenon specific to Trubridge’s native New Zealand—respectively, a small fresh water shrimp, a sea urchin, an indigenous fibre-bearing plant, and a fish trap made from woven vines.

In addition to fulfilling Trubridge’s paradigm of getting his “ideas from wild spaces” and creating “forms of elemental simplicity,” each of the Seed System lamps are distinctly autonomous and definitively beautiful. The way the light cascades off the differently colored interiors and plays upon the latticed geometry creates an effect that rivals nature herself.

Via Inhabitat.

About the Designer: David Trubridge has built an impressive portfolio from a demanding constraint—complete environmental awareness. This means that all of his lighting and furniture uses timber from sustainably-managed plantations; that his designs favor plywood because it doesn’t produce sawdust and thus uses resources more efficiently; and that each piece is finished in organic, non-toxic natural oils. Furthermore, Trubridge manufactures all product from his home base of New Zealand. The result is a distinctive collection with regional affinities and global appeal—which Trubridge squares with his environmental ethos via the impressive Seed System of flatpack shipping.