A great strength in the design sector in Denmark is the phenomenal number of small and independent companies - designers, workshops, craft studios and design consultancies - in the country and the number is growing all the time.

I first met Jakob Forum with his company Haeng at Finderskeepers last year. Finderskeepers is a lively market place for design, crafts, fashion and food that was held over a weekend at TAP1 on the Carlsberg site in Copenhagen and is also held regularly in Aarhus. It attracts a really lively and mixed group of customers but with a strong element of young people and young families so it’s a great place to pitch ideas and new products.

Jakob has a background as a carpenter but has combined that with his idea for lighting that is very sculptural. The lights are put together from simple geometric elements that are beautifully turned in wood or made from natural materials like cork and wool. Each part has a strong sense of form and silhouette, but there are also strong colours. The starting point is a bulb holder and its light flex and all the other elements are threaded on to that so of course the flex itself can be a strong colour and can set the character of the final arrangement of the light.

Several ideas here are important: the individual pieces are beautifully made and presented and the final boxing and packaging is deceptively simple but well thought out and what is important is the participation of the buyer - not just choosing the individual elements, which is great fun, but also deciding, back at home, just how those pieces are to be strung together - and of course in the future, or in a different room or a different home, the pieces can be moved around to create a different effect.

a suggestion for the starting point ... a light on the display at northmodern

the light in my apartment that I bought last year at Finderskeepers in Copenhagen

Haeng has just opened a store and showroom in Copenhagen and their stand at northmodern looked really good … this is all a very confident move forward for a new company and they really do deserve to succeed.

Haeng, Vesterbrogade 204, 1800 Frederiksberg

Opening - Wednesday to Friday 10 - 17 and the second Saturday of each month 10 - 15

Perhaps the ultimate in customer engagement that was shown at Finderskeepers was the Haeng light system designed by Jakob Forum. In fact I was so engaged I ended up buying one of the lamps.

The starting point is a large “mega Edison” bulb in a standard lamp holder on a long coloured or flecked cable with a large wood sphere that is hollowed out with a hole in the top so it drops down over the lamp holder. You start by choosing the colour of flex and one of a number of timbers used for the main bottom sphere.

Then the top of the counter of the stand at Finderskeepers was divided up into compartments. In the different sections, protected by straw … well actually shredded paper that looks like straw … were smaller wood spheres in oak, beech, walnut, wenge and other beautiful timbers along with cones, cylinders and drop shapes either in smooth, sanded wood or painted in colours including light and dark grey or cream or dark green and there were large spheres wound in coloured thread and spheres cut from cork. All have a hole through them and they are strung like beads, onto the electric cable dropping down to rest on the bulb holder.

All the shapes are carefully finished to bring out the grain of the wood and the painted elements are perfectly finished and compliment the colours and tones of the timbers.

A rectangle of leather was laid across the counter and slowly you put together the arrangement you want. The final lamp you design is packed in a strong box in unbleached card with more straw/shredded paper. And that’s it. Hooked. Or do I mean well and truly strung.

Of course the level of engagement in selecting the combination of pieces is important and everyone will remember where and when they bought the lamp and who they were with and what influenced their choice and of course if you move the lamp to a different room or want to change the design you simply pull out the flex and re string the elements into a different arrangement. Now there’s customer engagement with a design.

Haeng