I still don’t have it/one, but that’s not important right now. What matters is that the truncated icosahedron chandelier made of Perspex prisms and fishing line that Buckminster Fuller concocted as a belated wedding present for HRH Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon remains in good hands, and is well-cared for.
At some point after blogging about its 2007 appearance in a World of Interiors feature, and after tracing its original sale, I realized that was not some random table in a random former cheesemaker’s cottage in Somerset it had been sitting on. It had been acquired by Niall Hobhouse, and the cottage was part of Shatwell Farm. Hobhouse had made the working corner of his ancestral lands into the site of Drawing Matter, his ambitious archive of architectural drawings and research.
Last fall, Drawing Matter moved into town, and the chandelier came with it. Came home, in a way. In 2008, seeking to fill out its history, Hobhouse invited His Lordship to share his recollections of this singular object. Apparently it was too big to fit through the doorway of their private apartments at “KP,” so it was installed over the stairs. And indeed, it was remembered less as a two-years-late wedding present, and more of a way for Fuller to gain an audience, and perhaps, patronage for his world-building architectural schemes.
Anyway, last week Jesper Authen of Drawing Matter kindly sent along a photo of the chandelier, which lends a mid-century Kensington Palace vibe to the archive’s new Central London space. Truly I’ve never seen it looking better.
Buckminster Fuller: Geodesic Chandelier [drawingmatter.org]
Previously, related: On The Table: Buckminster Fuller Chandelier
Found, Sort Of: That Buckminster Fuller Chandelier
In other Anthony Armstrong-Jones Home Decor news: his guncle’s needlepoint rug