Secto

The Finnish lighting company Secto Design Oy are based in the town of Espoo some 20 kilometres west of Helsinki. Their birch lampshades, designed by the architect Seppo Koho, are made with thin strips of wood set around formers in aircraft plywood. The birch is left with a natural finish or it can have either a laminate face (in black or white) or a walnut veneer. 

The lampshades come in a number of shapes - Octo has the silhouette of a garlic bulb, Victo is dome-shaped and Puncto and Secto 4200 (shown here) are simple and very elegant cone shapes. The strips of birch form a gentle shutter that gives a soft glow to lamp when seen in profile but with a soft pool of light directed down.