Lighting the way for sustainable design
New Zealand’s best known furniture designer David Trubridge celebrates 20 years of his iconic pendant light
4 min
David Trubridge is not one for standing still.
Whether it’s finding his own path in seldom explored parts of the world, or reviewing the production processes of his internationally recognised lighting range, the English-born designer is, it would seem, in a constant state of movement.
That’s not to say he is always working.
For Trubridge, who has made his life in Aotearoa New Zealand, taking time to explore areas as diverse as Antarctica and Iceland through to Patagonia and remote parts of Australia, is about giving himself time just to be.
In Australia recently to celebrate the 20th anniversary of his emblematic Coral light at the Sydney Mondoluce store, as well as their affiliates in Brisbane and Hobart, he made time to take a hike through Tasmania.
“I need that ability to recharge,” he says. “I love to get right off the trail because when you stick to the path, there’s a safety factor where you know you will always find your way back.
“I want to find my own course, and see where it leads me. That’s my design philosophy too.”
Trubridge’s path to success is the stuff of legend. A self-taught designer and furniture maker, he studied naval design and had already enjoyed professional success on a small scale while living in the UK, initially creating pieces of furniture for his family and smaller clients before expanding to commissions for significant sites such the Victoria & Albert Museum and St Mary’s Cathedral In Edinburgh.
In the 1980s, Trubridge and his wife Linda decided to sell their house, buy a yacht and set sail with their two children, arriving in Aotearoa New Zealand in 1985. By 1988, he had exhibited at the National Furniture Exhibition at Auckland Museum.
As his opportunities expanded, the Trubridges sold their yacht in the early 1990s, using the money to fund building their own home — and a studio for David. Local interest in their house was such that Trubridge went on to design a number of homes in the area.
Designs for more furniture followed, notably, the Body Raft bench, which Trubridge took to the Milan Furniture Fair in 2000, where it was picked up by Italian design powerhouse Capellini.
Interested in the applications of plywood but, Trubridge turned his attention to lighting, resulting in the Coral design. Again, Trubridge made the trip to Milan in 2004, where it was warmly received — and an ‘overnight success’ story was born.
”I was a guy in a shed in the backyard when Capellini picked up the Body Raft bench,” he says. “The market for handmade furniture in New Zealand was very small and I was looking for a bigger market.”
Twenty years on, the Coral design has been joined by a range of biophilic pendant lights, including the Toru, the Navicula and the Kōura. All made from bamboo plywood and shipped out to clients in kit form to reduce the amount of packaging and space required, the lights are designed to be both sculptural and throw shadow patterns.
While the lights are highly successful commercially, it’s evident that Trubridge continues to strive for improvement, particularly in terms of environmental impacts.
“The design process does not really change much for me,” he says. “It is more important for me where we source the materials,” he says. “A lot of the embodied energy you can’t recycle. I would like to source a new material that is of our land, that is compostable and recycled. I’ve been looking at New Zealand flax which is very fibrous, like hemp.”
In the meantime, he has eliminated almost all plastics from the production process in recent years and he is exploring energy efficient lighting options beyond LEDs. For every Toru light sold, $50 goes to Sustainable Coastlines, a New Zealand charity committed to keeping the country’s beaches clean and plastic free.
While there is still much work to be done in terms of sustainability, Trubridge is hopeful.
“There is an awful long way to go but the mood is there, I think. There will be some big changes,” he says.
“We are trying to achieve sustainability and we are working towards it. We are always trying to improve and do better. How can we supply the things that people need that have the least impact?”
Only time — and more work — will tell.
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The lunar flyby would be the deepest humans have traveled in space in decades.
4 min
It’s go time for the highest-stakes mission at NASA in more than 50 years.
On April 1, the agency is set to launch four astronauts around the moon, the deepest human spaceflight since the final Apollo lunar landing in 1972.
The launch window for Artemis II , as the mission is called, opens at 6:24 p.m. ET.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration teams have been preparing the vehicles to depart from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center on the planned roughly 10-day trip. Crew members have trained for years for this moment.
Reid Wiseman, the NASA astronaut serving as mission commander, said he doesn’t fear taking the voyage. A widower, he does worry at times about what he is putting his daughters through.
“I could have a very comfortable life for them,” Wiseman said in an interview last September.
“But I’m also a human, and I see the spirit in their eyes that is burning in my soul too. And so we’ve just got to never stop going.”
Wiseman’s crewmates on Artemis II are NASA’s Victor Glover and Christina Koch, as well as Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen.
What are the goals for Artemis II?
The biggest one: Safely fly the crew on vehicles that have never carried astronauts before.
The towering Space Launch System rocket has the job of lofting a vehicle called Orion into space and on its way to the moon.
Orion is designed to carry the crew around the moon and back. Myriad systems on the ship—life support, communications, navigation—will be tested with the astronauts on board.
SLS and Orion don’t have much flight experience. The vehicles last flew in 2022, when the agency completed its uncrewed Artemis I mission .
How is the mission expected to unfold?
Artemis II will begin when SLS takes off from a launchpad in Florida with Orion stacked on top of it.
The so-called upper stage of SLS will later separate from the main part of the rocket with Orion attached, and use its engine to set up the latter vehicle for a push to the moon.
After Orion separates from the upper stage, it will conduct what is called a translunar injection—the engine firing that commits Orion to soaring out to the moon. It will fly to the moon over the course of a few days and travel around its far side.
Orion will face a tough return home after speeding through space. As it hits Earth’s atmosphere, Orion will be flying at 25,000 miles an hour and face temperatures of 5,000 degrees as it slows down. The capsule is designed to land under parachutes in the Pacific Ocean, not far from San Diego.
Is it possible Artemis II will be delayed?
Yes.
For safety reasons, the agency won’t launch if certain tough weather conditions roll through the Cape Canaveral, Fla., area. Delays caused by technical problems are possible, too. NASA has other dates identified for the mission if it doesn’t begin April 1.
Who are the astronauts flying on Artemis II?
The crew will be led by Wiseman, a retired Navy pilot who completed military deployments before joining NASA’s astronaut corps. He traveled to the International Space Station in 2014.
Two other astronauts will represent NASA during the mission: Glover, an experienced Navy pilot, and Koch, who began her career as an electrical engineer for the agency and once spent a year at a research station in the South Pole. Both have traveled to the space station before.
Hansen is a military pilot who joined Canada’s astronaut corps in 2009. He will be making his first trip to space.
Koch’s participation in Artemis II will mark the first time a woman has flown beyond orbits near Earth. Glover and Hansen will be the first African-American and non-American astronauts, respectively, to do the same.
What will the astronauts do during the flight?
The astronauts will evaluate how Orion flies, practice emergency procedures and capture images of the far side of the moon for scientific and exploration purposes (they may become the first humans to see parts of the far side of the lunar surface). Health-tracking projects of the astronauts are designed to inform future missions.
Those efforts will play out in Orion’s crew module, which has about two minivans worth of living area.
On board, the astronauts will spend about 30 minutes a day exercising, using a device that allows them to do dead lifts, rowing and more. Sleep will come in eight-hour stretches in hammocks.
There is a custom-made warmer for meals, with beef brisket and veggie quiche on the menu.
Each astronaut is permitted two flavored beverages a day, including coffee. The crew will hold one hourlong shared meal each day.
The Universal Waste Management System—that’s the toilet—uses air flow to pull fluid and solid waste away into containers.
What happens after Artemis II?
Assuming it goes well, NASA will march on to Artemis III, scheduled for next year. During that operation, NASA plans to launch Orion with crew members on board and have the ship practice docking with lunar-lander vehicles that Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin have been developing. The rendezvous operations will occur relatively close to Earth.
NASA hopes that its contractors and the agency itself are ready to attempt one or more lunar landing missions in 2028. Many current and former spaceflight officials are skeptical that timeline is feasible.
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