Is it possible to create new design? Yes it is, if you think and are inspired by your heart.
Our hearts have grown up in the gloomy darkness of the Scandinavian winter and in the brilliant sunshine of the Scandinavian summer. A double life that involves us in a complicated love affair with light and shadow, darkness and shape. This double life creates a fantastic seed bed for functional design, combined with emotion.
When Zero was set up in 1978, the founders had long experience – of glass. This experience lead them to leave glass for a while – then return – and start to make lampshades from sheet metal instead. Börge Lindau, the designer, was attracted by the daring idea and began a long-term involvement.
Considering their limited resources, they felt that the choice of material for the first lamps was very important, so that the lamps would be perceived as being new, and attract publicity for their innovative design. So he suggested that a suitable material would be perforated sheet metal, and the decision was made. The choice of material then achieved such a success that for the first ten years, almost all the product range consisted of lampshades of all shapes and sizes, made from a variety of types of perforated sheet metal.
Slowly but surely, Zero began to expand and they moved their operations from the garage where they started up, to an industrial unit in central Nybro. There was plenty of space for the company here which, after a few years, began to grow at an increasing rate. When Börge Linday phased out his involvement to devote time to Blå Station, his own furniture company, Zero initiated their long-term and fruitful collaboration with another designer, Per Sundstedt. He then got tired of sheet metal and wanted to start designing glass lampshades. The time was right, and Zero’s product range whas for several years dominated by various glass lampshades, many designed by Per Sundstedt.
Zero now work with some of the foremost Scandinavian designers such as Thomas Bernstrand, Mattias Ståhlbom, Fredrik Mattson, the Front design group, Mia Gammelgaard, Jens Fager, Monica Förster etc.
The family company Zero manufactures and sells attractive lighting fittings for all types of space. We use up-to-date technology and our designers are innovative problem solvers who often surprise. All of 80% of our subcontractors are located directly nearby us. This is both environmentally sound and offers great flexibility when it comes to varying and modifying projects. Innovation, quality, attraction and durability have been our catchwords since our beginnings in 1978.
Zero
Long and proud
Hush! Listen carefully, and you’ll hear the characteristic sounds of a glassworks. Next door to Zero is one of the oldest glassworks in Sweden: Pukeberg. In the blowing-room, the pipes are dipped into the red-hot smelted glass in one of the crucibles. The glassblower, sometimes the artist himself, directs the pipe upwards and blows. Not too hard, nor too little. And for God’s sake, not too long as that would spell disaster! The blowpipes turn continuously; previously every step of the production was managed by a different profession. The gatherer started, then gave way to the blower, then the stem-maker and then finally the master guaranteed a high-quality finish. During one period at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the glassworks was part of the wholesaler Böhlmark’s lamp factory. The then director introduced a series of improvements for the workers and sold the glassware all over Sweden. After World War II, sales to war-torn nations became so comprehensive that the glassworks was expanded to such an extent that suddenly, the Pukeberg glassworks could boast about being the longest
glassworks in the land — 175 metres!
The art of glassblowing is the region’s greatest pride, and Nybro, where Pukeberg lies, is called The City in the Glass Kingdom. Zero takes the works’ fittings manufacturing further, and today Pukeberg is a meeting-place for art, design, craft and handicraft. Beyond the glassworks and artist’s studios, the site
adjoins the Linnaeus University design courses, the Design Archive, the Home Crafts Consultants and the Nybro Arts Society.
It is often in encountering these neighbouring creative minds that new ideas and innovation grow, and that proud tradition of arts and crafts are carried on. Zero combines this with lifegiving impulses from our designers worldwide. The world outside our own in Nybro.
Our hearts have grown up in the gloomy darkness of the Scandinavian winter and in the brilliant sunshine of the Scandinavian summer. A double life that involves us in a complicated love affair with light and shadow, darkness and shape. This double life creates a fantastic seed bed for functional design, combined with emotion.
When Zero was set up in 1978, the founders had long experience – of glass. This experience lead them to leave glass for a while – then return – and start to make lampshades from sheet metal instead. Börge Lindau, the designer, was attracted by the daring idea and began a long-term involvement.
Considering their limited resources, they felt that the choice of material for the first lamps was very important, so that the lamps would be perceived as being new, and attract publicity for their innovative design. So he suggested that a suitable material would be perforated sheet metal, and the decision was made. The choice of material then achieved such a success that for the first ten years, almost all the product range consisted of lampshades of all shapes and sizes, made from a variety of types of perforated sheet metal.
Slowly but surely, Zero began to expand and they moved their operations from the garage where they started up, to an industrial unit in central Nybro. There was plenty of space for the company here which, after a few years, began to grow at an increasing rate. When Börge Linday phased out his involvement to devote time to Blå Station, his own furniture company, Zero initiated their long-term and fruitful collaboration with another designer, Per Sundstedt. He then got tired of sheet metal and wanted to start designing glass lampshades. The time was right, and Zero’s product range whas for several years dominated by various glass lampshades, many designed by Per Sundstedt.
Zero now work with some of the foremost Scandinavian designers such as Thomas Bernstrand, Mattias Ståhlbom, Fredrik Mattson, the Front design group, Mia Gammelgaard, Jens Fager, Monica Förster etc.
The family company Zero manufactures and sells attractive lighting fittings for all types of space. We use up-to-date technology and our designers are innovative problem solvers who often surprise. All of 80% of our subcontractors are located directly nearby us. This is both environmentally sound and offers great flexibility when it comes to varying and modifying projects. Innovation, quality, attraction and durability have been our catchwords since our beginnings in 1978.
Zero
Long and proud
Hush! Listen carefully, and you’ll hear the characteristic sounds of a glassworks. Next door to Zero is one of the oldest glassworks in Sweden: Pukeberg. In the blowing-room, the pipes are dipped into the red-hot smelted glass in one of the crucibles. The glassblower, sometimes the artist himself, directs the pipe upwards and blows. Not too hard, nor too little. And for God’s sake, not too long as that would spell disaster! The blowpipes turn continuously; previously every step of the production was managed by a different profession. The gatherer started, then gave way to the blower, then the stem-maker and then finally the master guaranteed a high-quality finish. During one period at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the glassworks was part of the wholesaler Böhlmark’s lamp factory. The then director introduced a series of improvements for the workers and sold the glassware all over Sweden. After World War II, sales to war-torn nations became so comprehensive that the glassworks was expanded to such an extent that suddenly, the Pukeberg glassworks could boast about being the longest
glassworks in the land — 175 metres!
The art of glassblowing is the region’s greatest pride, and Nybro, where Pukeberg lies, is called The City in the Glass Kingdom. Zero takes the works’ fittings manufacturing further, and today Pukeberg is a meeting-place for art, design, craft and handicraft. Beyond the glassworks and artist’s studios, the site
adjoins the Linnaeus University design courses, the Design Archive, the Home Crafts Consultants and the Nybro Arts Society.
It is often in encountering these neighbouring creative minds that new ideas and innovation grow, and that proud tradition of arts and crafts are carried on. Zero combines this with lifegiving impulses from our designers worldwide. The world outside our own in Nybro.
