Panthella Lamp – Verner Panton for Louis Poulsen – 70 cm

Table lamp model “Panthella“, designed by the Dane Verner Panton for Louis Poulsen in acrylic, 1970s edition

• H 72 CM x Shade diameter 50 CM.
• Foot diameter 33 CM.

Large Panthella Lamp – Verner Panton for Louis Poulsen

This large Panthella lamp is an early edition by Louis Poulsen, designed by Verner Panton in 1971. Standing approximately 70 cm tall, it belongs to the first generation of the large Panthella table lamp, considerably more imposing than the table versions currently produced. Its wide hemispherical shade in opaline acrylic and its spectacular tulip base form a continuous silhouette, characteristic of the organic and futuristic vocabulary developed by Panton in the early 1970s.

The example presented here possesses particularly interesting elements for its dating. The Louis Poulsen label mentions its model number 23430, an early type number associated with the large table Panthella. Its switch is moreover directly integrated into the tulip base of the lamp and not placed on the cable, a characteristic encountered only on early editions of the Panthella table lamp.

Early Louis Poulsen label mentioning the Panthella model number 23430

Finally, Poulsen no longer produces Panthella lamps in this format. These elements make it possible to distinguish it from the numerous later productions of a model that remained in the catalogue for several decades.

A lamp whose base participates in the lighting

The Panthella rests on a particularly ingenious lighting principle. Verner Panton wanted both the shade and the lamp base to play the role of reflector. The wide hemispherical diffuser in opaline white acrylic allows soft light to pass through while directing part of it downward. This light then strikes the flared trumpet-shaped base, whose surface participates in its redistribution throughout the space.

Louis Poulsen still describes this principle today as one of the fundamental characteristics of the model: the light is not only diffused by the shade, it is also reflected by the base. This interaction explains the Panthella’s particularly soft and homogeneous lighting and gives a genuine function to its sculptural form.