There are only a handful of artists like Luke Jacomb, a second-generation New Zealand glass authority, he is at the forefront of this extraordinary movement. Editor Trudi Brewer went behind the scenes of Lukeke Design to watch the master at work - one of her favourite artists.
Luke Jacomb with Archie
“The process takes 20 years, of practice for 40 minutes of blowing.”
Luke Jacomb grew up around glass. Fragile, transparent, yet universally practical, his New Zealand father and Danish mother nurtured his career with the family business in mind. From his teens, Jacomb worked with his father at Gaffer Glass. Founded in 1993 in Auckland, along with a studio glass blowing business his father is a world authority on glass colouring, using a blend of lead oxide crystal matrix, Gaffer Glass is unique in offering a rainbow of coloured glass both for glassblowers and glass casters. With two operations, (one in NZ), Gaffer Glass in now located Portland, in the USA exporting glass around the world. It was learning by osmosis that Jacomb learnt the craft of glass blowing and founded Lukeke Design in 2006.
Lukeke Design’s Luke Jacomb with glass blower Matt Hall
Destined to be in the industry, he is one artist that has found unique ways of pushing the limits with this brittle medium, making his mark on the glass art industry, both technically and commercially. Working from his Auckland workshop in Avondale, Jacomb has managed to create a firm following with the handmade wall mounted cast crystal native New Zealand birds including the Bellbird, Fantail, Silvereye, Stitchbird, Swallow, Kingfisher, Tui, Shining Cuckoo and Saddleback to the tiny, yet perfectly formed Tomtit, in 44 mesmerising colours. The range of feminine flowers, camellias and peonies, and objects such as Crushed Tumbles and Crushed Vases, to the covetable, on-off blown Lamp Pendant lights, Lukeke Design can be seen in grand installations to living rooms around the world.
Glass is everywhere, we barely notice it, unlike Luke Jacomb, it’s in his DNA. It’s also one of the world's oldest and most versatile man-made materials. Made from sand (silicon dioxide) it becomes a piece of art, once Jacomb tints the raw material and then melts the glass to 1100 degrees to turn it into the liquid form he can manipulate. Once heated the glass is cut (easily done at that heat, it slices like an orange peel), and while the process seems swift, going from a hot lava-like floating blob to a unique pendant light, is artful and precise. It’s the skill and speed at which Jacomb works you realise these freeform pieces and innovative techniques are unique. “The process takes 20 years, of practice for 40 minutes of blowing,” says Jacomb, who is self-effacing about his skill. Three hours of refining are required once the glass is cool, each piece perfectly imperfect, exactly what glass art should be. Three days a week Jacomb and his team are in the workshop, fulfilling bespoke orders blowing glass - a process that looks stressful to an outsider, not to mention the blistering heat at which Jacomb works in all day. “It’s when the glass is heated and moving that there is a short window to create the shape, and then get the vase or pendant light into the oven to cool slowly for 13 hours overnight,” says Jacomb. Five days a week another crew are at a new factory in Te Atatū Peninsula casting the crystal glass birds and flowers. It’s here Jacomb is planning to expand his own glass colouring techniques, experimenting with bespoke shades using sustainable glass made here in New Zealand “Lukeke is a team, we are artists, who work collaboratively, from the glass blowing business to casting. “We’re also working on making birds that can be installed outdoors while experimenting with colours and textures, which excites me.”
Lukeke Design Fantail Pīwakawaka, wings down, $325. Lukeke Design Kingfisher Kōtare, $325. Lukeke Design Saddleback, Tīeke - wings up, $500. Lukeke Design Bellbird Korimako, $325. Lukeke Design Stitchbird Hihi, $325. Lukeke Design Swallow Warou, $325. Lukeke Design Tomtit Kōmiromiro, $325. Lukeke Design Silvereye Tauhou, $325. The cast crystal glass birds come in 44 different colours see the full range here.
Once you covet a piece of Lukeke Design glass art (I have a wall of the cast crystal birds and a coral pendant light hanging over my dining room table), you will want more. Jacomb’s work is distinctive, it’s unique and each piece exquisite. I could stare at the native birds for hours. And, it seems, so could others. Lukeke Design has several private and public collections, including the most recent, a collaboration with Black Door Gallery and Square Peg Design in Los Angeles. The cast crystal glass birds were selected among 30 samples presented from glass artists around the world to sit in a stainless steel tree, and on the walls in the luxury shopping mall, Grand Canal, in Las Vegas. Lukeke Design works hang proudly in the Corning Museum of Glass in New York, USA. The Ebeltoff Glass Museum in Denmark, and the New Orleans Museum of Art in Louisiana, USA, to name a few.
Black Door Gallery Lukeke cast crystal glass birds in the Grand Canal Shopping mall in Las Vegas. The cast crystal glass birds, and Pendant Lights.
Closer to home the beautiful native birds (see our favourites from a huge selection) are what is Lukeke Design are famous for. Each collectable, affordable and so charming, it’s impossible to choose which one you need sitting poised and ready for flight on any wall in your home - I am living proof of that.
Trudi Brewer’s Lukeke Design collection
Above editor Trudi Brewer’s living room with a apricot pendant light, and bathroom with her cast crystal bird collection. Below Luke Jacomb in action creating a crushed glass vase.
Learn out more about Lukeke Design, or for a bespoke order click here.
Images by Rebekah Robinson Photography