During my exhibition at the Woonbeurs 2014 in Amsterdam I was so happy to meet a few other upcycle designers. It was great to talk to the two brothers from Indusigns and Stef van der Bijl from VanderBijl – design & interior. Good to meet these people in person because I only knew them from the internet, magazines and email. Stef was exhibiting his incredible lamps like Sew Me and I saw them for the first time in real life.
In a previous post about the Sew Me collection by VanderBijl I confessed that I really like old machines. I don’t care what the size is, as long as the machine is old. Just as a vintage typewriter or a sewing machine used for creating the Sew Me lamp. I think they are beautiful. Designer Stef van der Bijl, founder of VanderBijl – design & interior in Amsterdam | The Netherlands, takes really old machines and upcycles them into stunning design pieces.
Silent drills blasting light
The amazing collection you’re seeing here is from 2013 and is called ‘Chickmaster Flash Drills‘ and is according to Stef ‘One of the most sexy desk lamps from our collections’. For this collection he took antique aluminum drillingmachines and polished and redesigned them into desklamps. Nice feature, the original button let’s you turn the lamp on or off.
“These machines used to be the proud tool of every man. Now, after years of hard working and getting very dirty, the drills have been polished and show off their shiny aluminum skin on a desk or in a living room. This collection was bought from a collector and counts 30 drilling machines.”
Photos © VanderBijl
Stef van der Bijl about his work: “When things have lost their function, I try to give them a new life by creating a new function. A combination between antique and modern is interesting by contrast. So grab something old and place it in a new context. Don’t deny your own past, but use the past to create something new.”
And in my opinion that’s exactly what makes his designs so appealing. The fact that he creates something new that is based on the old in this day and age of internet and enormous technological development.
Design by VanderBijl – design & interior
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