PH Artichoke

Why it is renowned

The PH Artichoke is known well beyond Denmark for the way its leaves hide the light source while letting a soft glow through.¹ Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York bought one in 1983 and has shown it in its exhibition Making Design.¹ The Victoria and Albert Museum in London holds an Artichoke lamp made in Copenhagen by Louis Poulsen in its metalwork collection.²

The story

In 1958 Poul Henningsen was asked for a pendant for the Langelinie Pavilion, a new restaurant in Copenhagen, and finished the design in three months.³ He built it on his PH Septima of around 1927 to 1931, a lamp of clear and sandblasted glass shades.³ The 72 leaves sit in 12 rows of six, so the bulb cannot be seen from any angle and the light falls both inwards and outwards.³ The first leaves were copper.¹ Louis Poulsen, the Copenhagen maker Henningsen worked with all his life, makes it, and the lamps still hang in the Langelinie Pavilion.⁴³

What to know it by

• PH Artichoke1958Poul HenningsenPendant of 72 leaves in 12 rows
• Langelinie Pavilion1958The Copenhagen restaurant it was made for
• PH SeptimaPoul HenningsenGlass lamp of 1927 to 1931 it grew from
• PH 51958Poul HenningsenPendant of the same year