Being Colorado Mountain born and bred, I find nothing so foreign as bare sand. In fact, I've never been so terrified as when I drove the stretch between Yosemite and Las Vegas, an area in which-besides the twin sides of two lane blacktop-the landscape offers only an endless expanse of the grainy wind-borne stuff. But the amazing Desert Storm lamp by Nir Meiri definitely has me re-evaluating sand's intrinsic worth.

Desert Storm Lamp. Designed and Manufactured by Nir Meiri.

Nir Meiri's Desert Storm Achieves New Heights with Alternative Materials

Though it may be somewhat ironic to characterize the most natural and plentiful of the earth's gifts as "alternative," that's certainly the case when it comes to sand-for how many sand houses have you seen? How many sand chairs? And, for that matter, how many lightpieces? The answer to that last question is exactly one (if you know different, we'd certainly like to hear it).

Tel Aviv-based Meiri was inspired by the topography of the Negev Desert as she conceived of the singular LED-powered piece. She created the uniquely beautiful lampshades by pouring sand into a mold lined with glue. This simple recipe yields a surprisingly durable and surpassingly lovely design.

The setting sand leaves a subtly wavy pattern where the grains have adhered-very like one of those cross-section diagrams of the elements of the earth's crust. And when the lamp is lit, the sand-based shade is illumined to full effect, "spreading a soft light, which accentuates the amorphous shapes still present on the lampshade's surface, reminding us of the sand's original untamed nature."

Via Dezeen.

About the Designer: The work of Tel Aviv's Nir Meiri is invested in everyday objects, as one of her guiding principles is seeing these objects with fresh eyes and then recontextualizing them in surprising and enlightening ways. The formula has resulted in exciting new forms for wood, leather, and synthetic foam, as seen in Meiri's 1Stool and 2Stools series; as well as an ingenious use of the most unlikely material of sand, on display in the innovative Desert Storm Floor and Table Lamps.