Lighting makers & creators
Christchurch’s award-winning artisan lighting studio, Nightworks, is making a global impact with its hand-finished, bespoke products lighting up chic interiors from New Zealand to Europe and North America.
Credit: Dean Mackenzie
Nightworks Studio founders Ben and Kiri Wahrlich cut their teeth in industrial design and graphic design in Australia, where they first made waves in contemporary lighting design through their Sydney studio, Anaesthetic. Not long after their first child was born, they decided to move back to New Zealand and chose Christchurch as their new home.
“It was an easy choice,” says Kiri. “The future of the city was exciting: we saw an opportunity to put our mark on Christchurch, and it was a great, new city for our kids to grow up in.”
A shared love of mid-century architecture led the couple to the classic Poynton House in the heart of the city, where they set up Nightworks in 2019. Their first large commission here was a statement chandelier for the Public Trust Office building on Oxford Terrace. Building on their award-winning Code Pendant system, they created a stunning centrepiece to complement the building’s heritage character. This project ignited Nightworks’ profile across the world.
“We have recently installed a similar suspension in the home of an art collector in Washington, along with custom pendants in the Florida home of Paul Fireman, the founder of Reebok.”
Similar suspensions are being installed in some beautiful Christchurch homes in the coming months.
Nightworks’ bespoke Tasman family of modular pendant lighting, expressing a gentle waving form, is another design triumph, having won a 2022 NZ Best Design Award (Gold), a 2022 Australian Good Design Award and a prestigious 2023 Red Dot Award in Germany.
“We’re one of only three New Zealand companies to have won a Red Dot Award last year,” says Ben. “There’s nothing else like the Tasman pendant in the world. It’s unique and tells the story of our connection to the Tasman Sea, with each colourway in the range referencing colours we see in our coastal environment.”
Kiri and Ben bring complementary strengths to Nightworks. As creative director, Ben works on all product development while Kiri manages the studio. Having started out as a team of two, they now employ five others and are in the throes of recruiting for an eighth team member.
“Customisation, adaptation, and providing altered solutions is something we’re leaning into a lot now – so much so that we have outgrown our current production space,” says Ben. “We’ll be moving into a new dedicated production facility in the second half of this year while still keeping our existing space in Poynton House as our showroom and offices.”
Nightworks continues to light up spaces around the city with innovative, unique solutions. One of their recent commissions involved designing and creating gorgeous custom wall lights, featuring Oamaru stone, for the recently reimagined Untouched World Christchurch retail store.
One to watch this year is an upcoming new release, the La-De-Da Pendant. Designed as a large contemporary centrepiece, this pendant was well received at a recent soft launch at Auckland Design Week.