El Sol - when geniuses Collaborate

If I was a little inquisitive child, and I somehow happened to find my self in a room with El Sol, I would have yelled out through amazement stricken voice “mommy… mommy… did the sun fall from the sky?”

Funny question huh??? Well that is what you get when geniuses – FR-EE founder and creative director – Fernando Romero, and the famous Austrian crystal manufacturer Swarovski – collaborate to design something.

Photography by © robin hill

El Sol is the brainchild of this genius collaboration between Fernando Romero and Swarovski and both parties seem really happy about their collaboration. Nadja Swarovski, member of the Swarovski executive board comments: ‘we are delighted to celebrate ten years of partnership with design Miami/ and to collaborate with Fernando Romero on a work that is both visually and technically awe-inspiring. Truly challenging our product development team, Fernando has explored themes associated with heritage and nature to create el sol, an immersive installation on a vast scale, and we look forward to seeing the final result in Miami.’

El Sol is composed of 2880 customized Swarovski crystals. It has quite a resemblance with the sun. By scale, it is one billion times smaller than the sun and probably ten billion times cooler. It took more than 350 hours of engineering work, spanning a period of three months, to assemble at the Swarovski headquarters in Wattens, Austria.

Photography by © designboom

El Sol has its surfaces cut with pinpoint precision, to allow Light Emitting Diodes change the direction of light emitted from its core. “A spherical pool of LEDs refracts light off of the crystals”. “The project has allowed me to explore mathematics in relation to nature and my Mexican ancestry, which is very important and personal to my practice. The geometric patterns presented in el sol mirror those found in the natural world and remind us that certain proportions are woven into the very fabric of nature. The final product is meant to capture this sense of the curious synchronicity of the universe, an elusive balance between chaos and order.’ Says Fernando Romero

The design seeks to pay homage to the sacred geometry used by ancient Aztecs (“a member of the American Indian people dominant in Mexico before the Spanish conquest of the 16^th century” Apple Dictionary) and Mayans (a large family of American Indian languages spoken in central America and Mexico, of which the chief members are Maya, Quiché, and Tzeltal” Apple dictionary).