Choosing your lighting is a critical decision that should be considered at the earliest possible design stage, yet it is often overlooked. By introducing your lighting requirements and potential product selections into your interior design mood boards you can ensure that you create a harmonious link between the two disciplines.
Phos has a 135 year heritage of engineering and metal finishing. This history has allowed us to offer flawless finishes that can enhance and add value to any space.
Blending your finishes with the surrounding décor can create a poetical fusion of architectural details, adding depth, texture and character. Many designers are going bold – making statements by mixing their metals and finish colours to achieve enhanced interest on a project, whilst others go minimalist, selecting a light with a hidden source in the ceiling for a low glare, low key effect.
This miniature Zep 6 downlight sits invisibly in the ceiling
As well as harmonising a colour with other interior elements such as specialist taps, plug sockets, switches and feature pendants, bespoke finishes can really affect the feel of a light fitting. Colours such as gold or bronze can really soften and warm the visible tones of a luminaire. Shiny plated finishes such as polished copper or chrome are more stand-out and using a simple white with a dark insert such as black, totally negates any glare leading to high levels of visual comfort in areas where a more discreet light is required.
Setting the Tone
Special finishes can complement the tones of a space. Traditional metals such as brass and nickel can stand out against dark furniture and wood, or they can add warmth and sophistication to an area that generally utilises cooler palettes.
Phos' internal finishes are available in a range of tones including Wet Bronze, Aged Copper and Antique Gold
Cooler metals such as chrome and stainless steel work well in spaces with neutral colour palettes and teaming these with metallic accents can give an industrial edge to a space.
For those who have an eye for detail, it’s important to bear in mind that stainless steel can have a grain texture and you will want the grain to run in the same direction across all your fittings.
Chrome and stainless steel complement colour-neutral spaces
Mix or Match
Whatever your desire, Phos offers a range of totally bespoke luminaires available in the widest variety of custom finishes, giving you the ability to match the surrounding décor of your project. Or completely contrast with it!
Many projects are just crying out for an element of excitement and design trends too often follow the style of sticking to a single colour or material. Today, we’re more adventurous with mixing our finishes and open to introducing an element of juxtaposition and intrigue to our projects.
White spaces for example can look over-clinical, which can be overcome by adding warm tones such as bronze, brass or gold finishes.
It’s important not to go overboard with mixing tones as you can end up with a hotchpotch of shades and the space becomes too fussy. Try sticking to two or three finishes so you maintain the refinement and sophistication of your space.
The image below is a great example of Phos’ capabilities; the inside of the Zep 6 Trimless Eyeconic had the eyeball match the same copper colour of the two pendants to blend into the interior design.
The contrasting finishes add an edge to this space
Create a Showstopper
If you want to turn your light fitting into a stand-out statement piece, add a bold, bright colour or consider one of Phos’ speciality finishes. These include rust, aged copper, antique bronze and even wood or carbon! These finishes are unique to Phos and are usually reserved for larger decorative fittings, but can now be designed into our range of miniature, modular and powerful luminaires.
We can also finish our lights to any standard RAL colour, so you may want to match your lights to a statement piece, complementing the feature without overbearing it.
The Processes
There are a few key processes of finishing metal and each has its pros and cons. The main methods for architectural applications are powdercoating and anodising.
Powdercoating: this is a process of running an electric charge through the metal, which fuses the powder to the surface before being baked in a curing oven.
Anodising: an electrochemical process used to add a layer of natural oxide to an aluminium surface.
Both methods provide a protective coating for the metal, which does not easily scratch or flake. The main difference is that powdercoating can guarantee a specific colour match (which anodizing cannot) as the properties of the base metal are not consistent and can therefore react differently.
Powdercoating is also a cheaper process that can be applied to different substrates including steel and copper. Anodizing on the other hand can only be applied to specific grades of high quality aluminium, but does have the advantages of retaining the look and feel of a premium metal such as gold as well as working more effectively in extreme environments because of its UV stability.
Other finishing methods include plating and stainless steel. Plating is the cheapest option, but is liable to cracking and chipping unlike stainless steel, which offers a stronger protective finish perfect to marine environments.
About Phos’ Flawless Finishes
Speciality finishes are now available in the smallest of designs with Phos’ miniature but uniquely powerful range of LED luminaires. Our fittings are precision machined at our UK-based production factory, before being hand-finished by our team of experts; adding a personal touch of luxury to the design.
Our bespoke specialist metal finishing offers designers truly endless possibilities with their lighting design. We use only the highest quality metals available to ‘frame’ the light with the finish of your choice. We have the enormous advantage of being able to draw upon the 15 years of experience from our sister company, Cadisch MDA (www.cadischmda.com) who supplies premium metals to large-scale architectural projects. This combined with the knowledge from our century-old heritage in shaping metal, gives us a depth of reach that can only be dreamed about by our competition.
To simplify the selection process, we developed an innovative online Light Configurator tool that allows users to digitally build their fittings with their desired finish, before taking a virtual look at the end product.