Cirkus By Ago Large

AGO Lighting merges functionality with audacious design — the Korean brand launched at Maison&Objet in Paris in 2019 and creates remarkably playful and versatile wall lights, floor lamps and other fixtures intended to perk up as well as illuminate any space.

AGO was established by Woobok Lee and design director Mars Hwasung Yoo, a Stockholm-based industrial designer who established his own studio, BYMARS, in 2010. AGO is located in the Euljiro area of Seoul, Korea — this is an industrial center in Seoul where a vast range of print shops, modest factories and metal workshops have thrived since the 1970s despite the city’s rapid growth (the brand’s parent company has been manufacturing and distributing lighting products in the neighborhood for decades). The company’s name — derived from a Korean colloquialism for “old friends” — expresses the amicable relationship between the brand’s designers, its historic neighborhood​​ and the veteran laborers who populate its workshops. 

AGO partners with the skilled artisans of Euljiro to produce its range of venturesome lighting fixtures — popular items include those in its Cirkus collection, which features sculptural sconces and chandeliers made of aluminum and coated acrylonitrile butadiene styrene. When positioned above a dining table, these fixtures’ provocative curvaceous forms are likely to find their way into any mealtime conversation. 

The brand regularly collaborates with international designers and studios such as BYMARS, BIG-GAME (Switzerland), JWDA, Sylvain Willenz, Studio Word, Sebastian Herkner and others. 

On 1stDibs, find AGO Lighting chandeliers, wall lights, floor lamps and more.

Organic modern furniture is characterized by clean lines, an overall uncomplicated aesthetic and a prioritizing of natural, sustainable materials, such as wood and stone. There are lots of earth tones and natural-world textures rather than bright color palettes or fabrics embellished with busy patterns.

Organic furniture is minimalist and, owing to the ideas of venerable architect Frank Lloyd Wright, designed for warm spaces that promote harmony between human habitation and the great outdoors. Organic modern design, including in furniture and architecture, emerged in the 1930s.

Designers such as Andrianna Shamaris, Alguacil & Perkoff and Jörg Pietschmann — all known for organic modern design — have created furniture that brings dynamic and unpredictable energy to home interiors while emphasizing the importance of a relationship with the natural world.

Striking an appealing balance between our living spaces and nature doesn't have to be an arduous task — the broad selection of original organic modern furniture on 1stDibs includes solid wood tables, bamboo seating options, hand-knotted wall tapestries and more.

Chandeliers — simple in form, inspired by candelabras and originally made of wood or iron — first made an appearance in early churches. For those wealthy enough to afford them for their homes in the medieval period, a chandelier's suspended lights likely exuded imminent danger, as lit candles served as the light source for fixtures of the era. Things have thankfully changed since then, and antique and vintage chandeliers and pendant lights are popular in many interiors today.

While gas lighting during the late 18th century represented an upgrade for chandeliers — and gas lamps would long inspire Danish architect and pioneering modernist lighting designer Poul Henningsen — it would eventually be replaced with the familiar electric lighting of today.

The key difference between a pendant light and a chandelier is that a pendant incorporates only a single bulb into its design. Don’t mistake this for simplicity, however. An Art Deco–styled homage to Sputnik from Murano glass artisans Giovanni Dalla Fina (note: there is more than one lighting fixture that shares its name with the iconic mid-century-era satellite — see Gino Sarfatti’s design too), with handcrafted decorative elements supported by a chrome frame, is just one stunning example of the elaborate engineering that can be incorporated into every component of a chandelier.

Chandeliers have evolved over time, but their classic elegance has remained unchanged. Not only will the right chandelier prove impressive in a given room, but it can also offer a certain sense of practicality. These fixtures can easily illuminate an entire space, while their elevated position prevents them from creating glare or straining one’s eyes. Certain materials, like glass, can complement naturally lit settings without stealing the show. Brass, on the other hand, can introduce an alluring, warm glow. While LEDs have earned a bad reputation for their perceived harsh bluish lights and a loss of brightness over their life span, the right design choices can help harness their lighting potential and create the perfect mood. A careful approach to lighting can transform your room into a peaceful and cozy nook, ideal for napping, reading or working.

For midsize spaces, a wall light or sconce can pull the room together and get the lighting job done. Perforated steel rings underneath five bands of handspun aluminum support a rich diffusion of light within Alvar Aalto's Beehive pendant light, but if you’re looking to brighten a more modest room, perhaps a minimalist solution is what you’re after. The mid-century modern furniture designer Charlotte Perriand devised her CP-1 wall lamps in the 1960s, in which a repositioning of sheet-metal plates can redirect light as needed.

The versatility and variability of these lighting staples mean that, when it comes to finding something like the perfect chandelier, you’ll never be left hanging. From the whimsical — like the work of Beau & Bien’s Sylvie Maréchal, frequently inspired by her dreams — to the classic beauty of Paul Ferrante's fixtures, there is a style for every room. With designs for pendant lights and chandeliers across eras, colors and materials, you’ll never run out of options to explore on 1stDibs.