Serendipity Births a Lighting Line by Flack Studio and Volker Haug

After shattering a sconce during installation, David Flack called on lighting designer Volker Haug for a last-minute solution—and the two ended up creating a stellar range of sculptural luminaires that revels in its diversity

December 23, 2024

Volker Haug and David Flack. Photo: Pier Carthew

David Flack was in a dilemma: A vintage wall sconce’s glass fitting irreparably broke during installation. Its backplates were already affixed to the wall’s high gloss lacquer paint, so the founder of the award-winning Australian interiors firm Flack Studio urgently needed help. In a moment of desperation, he decided to call on his close friend and collaborator Volker Haug to design a new site-specific fitting on the spot. “Our relationship with Volker Haug Studio was longstanding,” Flack tells Galerie of the lighting upstart based a five-minute drive away in Brunswick, one of Melbourne’s most creatively dynamic suburbs. “I knew we could rely on them to create something immediately that would solve the issue.”

Haug was the ideal person for the job. Not only has his 20-year-old studio endured as one of Australia’s stalwart purveyors of decorative yet streamlined lighting imbued with rich materiality, but collaboration and relationships—often with local fabricators who have worked closely with him for decades—are key to how his operation ticks. Fittingly enough, he and Flack devised a rapid-fire solution that was “designed, prototyped, and produced in an incredibly short amount of time,” Haug says. “It wouldn’t have been possible without the trust we had in each other.” The day was saved, but the renewed camaraderie between the two was just beginning.

The Me and You Collection installed at Volker Haug’s Melbourne showroom. Photo: Pier Carthew

Beyond proving a potent reminder about the power of collaboration, the incident soon evolved into an occasion for Haug and Flack to devise a more robust lighting range. With the sconce’s eight-inch square back plate set as an initial constraint, the two began toying with materials and forms before loosening the parameters and allowing their shared creativity to take over. What resulted is a multifaceted collection, fittingly called Me and You, that intentionally dodges categorization and embodies the duo’s creative simpatico.

Unlike most collections marked by strict features scaled across multiple fixtures, Me and You revels in its diversity. At its core is Bruce, a series of gridded cast brass sconces that can be installed as individual lights, a set of pairs, or as a series. Look closely, and experiments with materials echo throughout—the mesmeric Fleur pendant gently glows through a bud-like fiberglass lamp shell. It seems to share scant traits with the Tux table lamp, but its own cylindrical fiberglass shade is perched on a glass base gridded with brass binding details. Those grids subtly recur in the Me, Myself and I, a glimmering wall-mounted statement piece that emits a soft backlit glow behind its cast brass rectangular build.

Tux Lamp. Photo: Pier Carthew

Me, Myself and I sconces. Photo: Pier Carthew

Launching a collaborative lighting range pushed Flack slightly out of his comfort zone. His firm had already designed one-off luminaires for marquee projects like the Ace Hotel Sydney and a Melbourne home for Troye Sivan, many of which he shared with Haug during the Me and You ideation process. Until now, though, he never put his firm’s name behind a commercial collection. “Our foray into product had to be measured and tested,” Flack says. “We wanted to produce quality pieces and to have the ability to collaborate with people we trusted and admired.”

That steady approach bore fruit when the two revealed Me and You’s initial range at this year’s Milan Design Week. Designers were impressed, eager to learn more about the scale of Fleur, the customization potential of Bruce, and the outdoor suitability of the entire collection. That feedback quickly instigated the development of new pieces, from three Bruce varieties to a little sister to Fleur. There’s also the Tux pendant and wall sconce, which share the original’s curved fiberglass shade and brass binding details.

The Me and You Collection installed at Volker Haug’s Melbourne showroom. Photo: Pier Carthew

The whole array recently went on view at Haug’s showroom, a converted 1940s warehouse that Flack offered to refresh for the occasion. (“It’s not an offer you can refuse,” Haug says.) Echoing the duo’s Milan pop-up, Flack sourced a Halcyon Lake rug and reused textiles and wooden furniture custom-designed to complement the original collection. Walls are coated in a sumptuous shade of oxblood gloss paint, which offers a dynamic contrast to the ebullient paintings from Haug’s personal collection, most by local artists. A home-like ethos pervades, creating both a perfect setting for the Me and You collection to shine and a meaningful denouement for a stellar collection born from serendipity.

Below, see more of the Me and You collection in Volker Haug Studio’s showroom.