Your Interview As A Ceremony

Introduce yourself (name, company, position, country) and tell us how you got into lighting design (including education/qualifications).

We are Antonia Insunza and Alessia Pegorin, respectively we come from Chile and Italy. Since more than 8 years we live and work Berlin. In 2018 we founded our own lighting design studio As A Ceremony, based in Berlin. We are both trained architects and our approach to lighting comes from different paths. We studied at the school of Architecture of our respectively home towns, and shortly after graduating back in Chile, Antonia started to feel attracted to light as an immaterial part of architecture and applied to the Architectural lighting design Master in Wismar, Germany. Alessia approached the world of lighting because of her attraction to sculpturing objects that are part of our everyday life. Designing lighting fixtures is probably the ultimate way we have of sculpturing the light in its pure essence!

Tell us about your work – is there a specific type of project you like to work on or an area you specialise in and why?

Our practice as lighting designers is divided into 3 main parts: the lighting planning, the product development, the research in the field of lighting and we try to take forward the 3 of them equally. So, we cannot really say that there is a specific type of project we rather prefer to work on. In fact, as the name of our design studio implies – As A Ceremony–, what really matters to us is how we do projects. That is why, we try to apply our aesthetic of respect, as we like to define it. We always strive to improve the content of experience in a bid to awaken people to the ubiquitous complexities of the world we are living in.

What project are you most proud of and why?

The project we are probably most proud of is Time of your Light, a bioluminescence time-light that we are developing together with a glass crafter in France and that has been recently awarded.

We feel particularly connected to this project, as it probably represents and expresses our core values and manifesto at its best. This project is a reminder that we are not alone on this planet, that we are part of a chain and that it is our responsibility to protect it, both as humans and as professional designers.

Time of your Light gives us a moment of contemplation through a living light in the dark, it is an analogical escape from electricity and the digital world. A reminder that life on-demand, as we know it, is no longer sustainable and that a change must come.

What is the biggest challenge that you have overcome in your career?

Being professional young women far from your home country has not always been easy for us, and also after all these years, at times, we still have to confront ourselves with a different language and a very different culture. Sometimes it is hard to be taken seriously by our male counterparts, but we are constantly learning how to stand up for ourselves. At the beginning, we felt disappointed and upset, but now we know how our way around it!

How does light inspire you?

We believe there is a sacredness in light and shadow.

As phenomenon and experience, light is atmospheric and scientific at the same time, matter and waves, darkness and brightness that can bring us both to the most emotional places as well as help with physical wellbeing.

It is primordial, sensual and magical in the way it shapes the space, gives temperature, colours, volume and size.

What is your message for other Women In Lighting?

We are so glad we found this platform where women in our discipline from all over the world can support and acknowledge each other. It empowers us, and creates, even though we are all different and geographically far away, the sense of community we have long looked for.