Into the Light

‘Into the Light’ by A Curious Boy

A little while back Nigel Shearing, the creator and curator of the Gallery of Piano Curiosities in Weymouth contacted Pianodrome. He had been playing around with some ideas using piano parts; keys, keyslips, slices of lids, interesting parts of the action, arranging them into pleasing geometric formations and illuminating them and he was dreaming big.

I was immediately charmed by Nigel’s creativity and enthusiasm and together we made a plan to collaborate on a some sculptural furniture for our new space in Bruntsfield. The brief was to make a standard lamp. Nigel spent weeks in his workshop on the South coast of England meticulously cutting a piano lid with a panel saw into 1cm slices and arranging them at the top of a splayed array of piano keys sending me pictures and films featuring his beautiful wee gallery and his cat as he went. The day arrived and he drove non stop the length of the isles with three fragile, intricate and beautiful piano lampshades in the boot of his car to our Pianodrome warehouse workshop in Granton.

My old piano teacher visited us in Debenhams a few years back and was taken with a very ancient Collard and Collard grand with beautiful carved legs and sides. However, despite the best efforts of our Adopt team to repair it this beautiful old instrument with a century of song inside it had found its way into our sculpture workshop where, it transpires, it was waiting for just this moment.

Nigel had a vision. I could never have dreamed it. He would turn the entire grand piano onto its side and create the most extraordinary and character lamp stand the world has ever seen. After all, so big and beautiful was his lamp that nothing less would suffice to hold it aloft. He meticulously carved back the side and strings of the grand old grand working into the soundboard until he had the shape he wanted. Together we lifted her vertical, built her out til she was stable and reattached her beautifully carved legs. We transferred to Bruntsfield where, on the stage, she could light up the piano cafe. Filling her base with a heavy weight of piano pins as ballast we cantilevered out her glorious lampshade, wired in a bulb and turned her on.

Tadaaa!

Thank you Nigel for a wonderful week of piano creation. We look forward to more in the new year!