Gẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́ Lamp Collection by Salù Iwadi Studio foregrounds multiple histories of making

The sculptural, almost totemic lamps of the Gẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́ Lamp Collection appear as smooth, oval hollows punctuated by modular, eye-like disks, radiating a warm, golden glow from within. The light seems held inside—as if gathering, before releasing—lending the forms an almost womb-like presence. This sense of containment and inwardness is not incidental, but central to the conception of the lamps.

Designed by the Nigeria- and Senegal-based Salù Iwadi Studio, the product designs draw from the Gẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́ tradition of the Yoruba people across Benin, Togo and Nigeria, which celebrates awon iya wa (the primordial mother), by publicly honouring women, female ancestors, deities and elder women in the community. In doing so, it affirms feminine authority as central to both society and its spiritual fabric, recognising the essentiality of women in bringing and moulding life through fertility, motherhood and the organisation and development of community life.

Articulated in oak wood and brass, these lamp designs position light within this framework of feminine authority. For the Yoruba people, light exists and extends beyond illumination. Ìmólẹ́ (or light) is as much a carrier of ancestral guidance, spirituality and hope as it is a despensor of darkness.

“It is tied to consciousness, to clarity and to a kind of inner awakening. Light, in this context, is not neutral or passive; it is active, almost sentient. This understanding shaped the way we approached the lamps,” the studio’s founders, Toluwalase Rufai and Sandia Nassila, tell STIR. “Rather than designing objects that emit light openly and uniformly, we wanted to create forms that hold and regulate it. The vessels act almost like bodies or containers, where light is cradled, filtered and only gradually revealed. That’s where the idea of light as something ‘carried’ comes in, similar to how a womb contains and nurtures life before revealing it.” The 'sentient' lamps begin to perform less as an object and more as a body that holds and nurtures light.

The sculptural design collection unfolds across three lighting designs at two scales: GLD01 adopts a vertical composition, with three vessels stacked atop one another, suggesting a lineage from ancestor to mother to child. In contrast, GLD02 resolves this into a single, unified body, drawing these generational distinctions inward into one continuous presence. GLD03, though smaller in scale, carries the same conceptual weight in a more intimate expression.

The wooden ovoid vessels of the lamp reference the womb or the orí—the Yoruba conception of the head as ‘the seat of consciousness and destiny’. "The womb and the calabash are spaces that protect, regulate and transform what they hold," the product designers explain. Each vessel is carved with a sand-cast brass disk, which serves as a golden flourish and a diffuser of golden light. The surface of the brass, rough and grainy from casting, carries a sense of earth within it, as though it has come through something buried, something formed in darkness.

In this way, the objects feel grounded in Ayé— ‘the realm through which life, ancestry and cosmic force circulate’. Rather than allowing light to escape directly, the brass contains and filters it, releasing a controlled, ambient glow.  “The layering of the carved wood and the sand-cast brass elements creates moments of opacity and permeability, so light is never fully exposed,” the African designers share with STIR.

The contemporary design collection is handcrafted between Lagos and Marrakech. The brass is cast in Lagos, where metalworking remains a deeply rooted traditional practice, and the wood is carved and finished in Marrakech, drawing on equally rich traditions of woodworking—bringing distinct craft lineages and craftsmanship techniques into dialogue.

As the lighting designers explain, “This cross-territorial production is very much in line with how we think about the studio, as a space that connects geographies rather than isolates them. It’s not about juxtaposing Nigeria and Morocco for contrast, but about allowing techniques, gestures and sensibilities from both contexts to inform a single object”. It is this distributed, cross-territorial making that allows the designs to exist beyond a single point of authorship; sources of light spelt as a convergence of shared making across places and practices.

At its core, the Gẹ̀lẹ̀dẹ́ Lamp Collection moves beyond symbolism, grounding its ideas in the material and formal realities of the object itself. In shaping how light is contained and dispensed, the lamps become intentional, meaningful and refined objects. It also reflects the studio’s broader approach of drawing on African heritage and reworking it through a contemporary design language, contributing to greater visibility and understanding of African design in a global context.

“Ultimately, the lamps become a convergence of these practices. They carry within them multiple histories of making, and through that, reinforce our broader intention: to create objects that are grounded in specific cultural contexts, while remaining open and legible to a wider, global audience,” the studio relays. These lamps are as much sites of holding light as the lineages that make them possible; a site where different registers coalesce—from the metaphysical to the material—as cultural transmission held between body, world and idea.