A house we carry
John Cullen lit BBC productions before founding his company in London in 1981. The first showroom opened the following year on Smith Street in Chelsea, designed by Sally Storey herself. A partner from the start, she took over creative direction after the founder's death in the mid-1980s and has held it since.
The business does two jobs at once. It designs and manufactures its fittings in Britain, and it draws lighting schemes project by project. The doctrine has not changed: the fitting should disappear. The catalogue is built on very small recessed diameters, 30, 40 and 50 millimetres, across the Polespring, Polefinity, Pure and Arine families, with tight optics and an approach that works in layers, grazing light, object highlighting, backlighting, rather than through visible sources.
The first product designed in-house, the Polestar downlight of 1990, is still made under the name Polespring. The company also builds its own dimming systems, AmbiDim, Tune, One Room and Whole House, instead of outsourcing light control. Outdoors, the Kew and Hampton spotlights come in a Dark Sky version, and Waterspring and Aquabeam are submersible.
Artopia carries John Cullen in Geneva. This is the supplier to bring in early on a project: recessed fittings are decided with the ceiling, not after it.