Ambiente: Museums & Cultural Spaces

Foscarini’s Gregg lamps were chosen to illuminate the spaces of the Chicago Public Library in the heart of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park, a civic campus that intertwines architecture, landscape, art, and public spaces designed for the community. Selected by the Fisher Marantz Stone studio to dialogue with the vision of Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, Gregg’s aerial compositions diffuse a soft and ethereal light, creating a fluid connection between the interior spaces and the exterior landscape. With their organic and asymmetrical volumes, reminiscent of a pebble smoothed by water or the egg of a mythological creature, the lamps punctuate the reading and convivial spaces, integrating with the warmth of the large wooden bookcases.

Designed by Ludovica Serafini and Roberto Palomba, the collection has been part of the Foscarini portfolio since 2007 and is available in blown glass or polyethylene. For the library, Fisher Marantz Stone chose the lightweight and resistant polyethylene version, composing fixtures in X-Large, Large, and Medium sizes that illuminate both the Main Reading Room and the President’s Reading Room, the latter dedicated to a book collection reflecting the personal interests of President Obama and his wife. Thanks to the closed design of the diffuser, the lamps are perfect suspended at different heights, creating a diffuse light that seems almost to float.

An additional installation of Gregg lamps is located in the Center’s Hadiya Pendleton Atrium, an open and versatile space where visitors can meet and exchange ideas.