IKEA’s New Bamboo Lighting Beautifully Plays with Shadows |
When it comes to curating a space, there’s no brighter idea than nailing the lighting. Flick a few switches and zing, suddenly the room is warmer, cozier, and more layered, with pools of light creating depth and shadows adding another dimension. Even better if your table lamps, floor lamps, sconces, and pendants look just as good switched off as they do switched on.
That’s something IKEA has understood with its new VARPTROSS series. Across a table lamp, sconce, floor lamp, and linear pendant, the collection uses clean strips of bamboo bent into a softly curving silhouette that feels rooted in the traditional East Asian lantern while retaining a distinctly contemporary character.
Flick that switch, however, and they really come to life. Rather than simply casting direct light into the room, the bamboo of these IKEA products becomes part of the lighting itself. The layered slats filter the bulb’s beam, creating a softly patterned glow. Warm and gently diffused, these lights create the impression of layered lighting from a single source.
IKEA
VARPTROSS Table Lamp in Bamboo
The evenly spaced, light-hued bamboo of IKEA’s VARPTROSS table lamp makes an appealing objet before you even reach for the switch. Two layers of alternating bamboo slats are neatly woven at the top and bottom, allowing just enough light to escape through the gaps for a soft, diffused glow. Its elliptical 18 x 15cm footprint and 26cm height make it compact enough for a bedside table, but substantial enough to hold its own on a sideboard.
IKEA
VARPTROSS Wired-In Wall Lamp in Bamboo
The VARPTROSS table lamp appears to have been neatly sliced in half to create this distinctive sconce, with light escaping from both the top and bottom and filtering through the bamboo slats. It brings the same warm materiality to the walls, and while it can be hardwired, you could also easily use a remote-controlled smart globe in it.
IKEA
VARPTROSS Floor Lamp in Bamboo
The same idea is stretched vertically in this cylindrical floor lamp, standing just over one meter tall and spreading its filtered glow across the room. With a 2.3m cord and space for a single bulb, it creates a soft pool of light that gradually fades as it climbs, while the bamboo construction keeps the silhouette feeling light and airy.
IKEA
VARPTROSS Pendant Lamp in Bamboo
This is VARPTROSS at its most contemporary: a softly curving linear pendant that would look equally at home suspended above a kitchen island or brightening a dining room. Two bulbs spread light across its 79cm length, while the curved bamboo slats give the otherwise simple silhouette a little more architectural interest.
Across every rendition of VARPTROSS, the bamboo slats are bent and assembled by hand in Vietnam. Blending old and new, their rounded ends soften the harsh rigidity of vertical lines while also referencing the familiar shape of traditional bamboo lanterns.
The VARPTROSS range only landed on 1 July, but it is already attracting rave reviews, with fans praising the cozy glow created by the alternating slats. One thing to note: the lightbulbs aren’t included, but that does at least leave you free to choose your own warm-hued bulb and really lean into the ambience.
Natural materials are practically shorthand for a warm, cozy home — and they are finding their way into the loveliest lights. I’ve found six more designs that capture the same grounded, softly filtered glow below.
Alternative Ways to Get the Look
Dunelm
Abrielle Bamboo Table Lamp
Combining a flared wooden base with a squashed spherical shade, this characterful table lamp makes an impression before you even flick the switch. Pale bamboo, tactile rattan, and solid wood keep the look feeling natural rather than overly rustic, while evenly spaced slats allow the light to filter through, casting delicate stripes of shadow across the surrounding surfaces.
This handwoven wicker lamp leans more traditional, with a classic lantern silhouette finished with a woven handle arcing over the top. It is big enough to sit on the floor beside an armchair, though it would work just as well on a console or side table. A single bulb glows from within, with evenly spaced weave breaking up the light and throwing patterned shadows around the room. There’s also a smaller version for the bedside table, alongside a flush ceiling and domed pendant if you want to carry the woven look overhead.
Pooky Lighting
Larger Flower Pendant in Natural Rattan
This woven rattan pendant is more of a showstopper. Though it is an uplight, the light of three bulbs spills through the natural gaps in its domed, flower-like form. Suspended from a gold linked chain, with smaller chains holding the shade in place, it has an almost sculptural quality that catches the eye even when switched off. This is the larger version, though you could make an even more decorative statement by hanging it alongside its smaller style.
La Redoute
Lola Double Petal Rattan Light
Where IKEA’s VARPTROSS wall light keeps its bamboo slats pared back and contemporary, this rattan sconce takes the same natural-material approach somewhere much more romantic. A playful arrangement of overlapping rattan petals cups the bulb against the wall, allowing light to escape through the cross-hatched cane and giving the shade a distinctly floral flourish.
With its alternating bands of rattan, this bulbous pendant creates a varied glow as light moves through its woven surface. Three bulbs sprout from the center, cocooned within the squashed spherical shade, which takes its holiday cues from Soho Home’s beach houses in Mykonos and the Caribbean. It would happily bring that same escapist quality to a bedroom or living room, particularly when paired with other natural textures.
Cox & Cox
Oversized Woven Pendant
Bring the party home with this spherical woven pendant, which has all the visual appeal of a disco ball without the high-octane finish. Playful and tactile, squares of paper rope are woven in alternating horizontal and vertical directions, giving the shade plenty of texture and depth when switched off, then scattering a constellation of shadows once illuminated.
The appeal of IKEA’s new VARPTROSS series goes beyond its contemporary take on traditional bamboo lighting. Like these alternatives, it taps into our growing appetite for natural materials and tactile textures at home, using the qualities of bamboo, rattan, and woven fibers to soften both the look and the light of a room.
Houseplants may be the obvious way to bring a little of the outdoors in, but nature-inspired homewares can do much the same job, from sculptural stone objets to organically curved furniture and, of course, plenty of woven lighting.
For more inspiration, subscribe to Livingetc’s newsletter.
