Carlo Nason Cactus

A mid-century modern reference for today’s Murano glassmakers, Carlo Nason influenced the current tradition of glassmaking on an island renowned for it for hundreds of years. Celebrated for their exceptional designs, Nason’s lighting fixtures are sought after by collectors worldwide.

Learning to design and craft pieces from the family vetreria — rather than partaking in any formal training — Nason was working with the maestros at his family’s company furnace, V. Nason & C., attached to their family home by the time he was 11 years old. Although his roots are in Murano glassmaking, he took inspiration from the clean lines and natural colors of the Japanese metal vases he had seen in his youth at Milanese fairs.

Wanting to produce modern glass lamps, Nason worked with his family friend Gianni Mazzega of Mazzega Murano. For his Cascata chandelier (Italian for “waterfall”), which debuted in the 1960s, Nason achieved the effect of cascading water through an inverted pyramid of hanging glass plates, each individually mouth-blown and suspended from a chrome-plated frame for a dazzling, Art Deco–styled display.

The 1970s and 1980s were productive and creative years for Nason as the sole and independent designer at Mazzega Murano. His prolific career has also seen him design for other lighting manufacturers like I TRE, Murano Due and Kalmar.

After a mere four years as a glassmaker, Carlo Nason had his creations displayed at the Corning Museum of Glass in New York. The credit for the artisan’s pieces that were included in “Glass 1959” went to his family’s company, but the designs were all authored by Carlo.

Stepping away from the traditional, vibrant Murano stylings, Nason kept true to his inspiration, working with modern and simple forms that are relatively free of color. Nason told Palainco in a rare 2019 interview that his emotions inspired the shapes. And his legacy includes fixtures that are irreplicable and unreproducible, too — Nason made lighting pieces with multiple layers of glass that would be too costly or difficult to recreate today, and some designs were made with processes and materials now unavailable or banned in the glassmaking world.

Find an array of vintage Carlo Nason table lamps, floor lamps, decorative objects and more on 1stDibs.

The modern floor lamp is an evolution of torchères — tall floor candelabras that originated in France as a revolutionary development in lighting homes toward the end of the 17th century. Owing to the advent of electricity and the introduction of new materials as a part of lighting design, floor lamps have taken on new forms and configurations over the years. 

In the early 1920s, Art Deco lighting artisans worked with dark woods and modern metals, introducing unique designs that still inspire the look of modern floor lamps developed by contemporary firms such as Luxxu. 

Popular mid-century floor lamps include everything from the enchanting fixtures by the Italian lighting artisans at Stilnovo to the distinctly functional Grasshopper floor lamp created by Scandinavian design pioneer Greta Magnusson-Grossman to the Paracarro floor lamp by the Venetian master glass workers at Mazzega. Among the more celebrated names in mid-century lighting design are Milanese innovators Achille and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni, who, along with their eldest brother, Livio, worked for their own firm as architects and designers. While Livio departed the practice in 1952, Achille and Pier Giacomo would go on to design the Arco floor lamp, the Toio floor lamp and more for legendary lighting brands such as FLOS. 

Today’s upscale interiors frequently integrate the otherworldly custom lighting solutions created by a wealth of contemporary firms and designers such as Spain’s Masquespacio, whose Wink floor lamps integrate gold as well as fabric fringes. 

Visual artists and industrial designers have a penchant for floor lamps, possibly because they’re so often a clever marriage of design and the functions of lighting. A good floor lamp can change the mood of any room while adding a touch of elegance to your entire space. Find yours now on 1stDibs.