“Always leave a light on” was something Dausch’s parents would say whenever the family left the house, a way to make it look like someone was still home. Years later, in 2018, she gave the same title to her senior art show, a room-sized installation of a home filled with furniture she made herself. It was her first time making furniture, and though she didn’t know it then, the beginning of something much bigger. Returning to the phrase with this lamp, Dausch plays with the little things that make a house feel like a home, even in the absence of the people who live there.

Made from maple, the lamp features a base with hand-applied white striping that follows the natural grain of the wood. For the striping on the base, Dausch developed a variation of the finishing technique using a matte oil with white pigment. Each line follows the grain differently, making every lamp one of a kind.

Hanna Dausch of Han Studio is a woodworker and furniture maker based in Pittsburgh PA. Working primarily with turned wood, Dausch develops forms that simultaneously functions as furniture and sculptural art with an emphasis on material, scale, and the ways objects settle into a space.