IKEA makes good lamps. They are affordable, widely available, and designed to look decent in most spaces. If you need a lamp quickly and cheaply, IKEA will do the job.
But if you have been looking at your IKEA lamp for a year and thinking it should be something more -- something that feels like it belongs rather than something that just fills a space -- you are not alone. Here is what to consider when you are ready to upgrade.
What IKEA lamps do well
Accessibility. IKEA lamps are designed to be affordable and functional for as many people as possible. They are well-engineered for the price, widely stocked, and easy to replace. If you are furnishing a rental or a spare room, they make complete sense.
Where IKEA lamps fall short
IKEA lamps are designed by committee for mass production. They are made from new materials in offshore factories, optimised for cost, and built to a price point rather than a standard. The result is a lamp that looks fine but rarely feels special -- and that tends to get replaced every few years as tastes change or the product shows its age.
There is also the ubiquity problem. IKEA lamps are in millions of homes. Your lamp looks like your neighbour's lamp looks like your colleague's lamp.
What to look for in an IKEA lamp alternative
The qualities that IKEA lamps lack are exactly the ones worth prioritising when you upgrade:
- Genuine materials -- timber, glass, ceramic, stone. Materials that age rather than degrade.
- Local or transparent manufacture -- knowing where and how something was made matters, especially if sustainability is important to you.
- A considered form -- not a lamp designed to appeal to everyone, but one designed with a specific aesthetic in mind.
- Something unique -- an object that is yours rather than a catalogue item.
Lumo Bloc as an IKEA alternative
Lumo Bloc lamps are the opposite of IKEA in almost every meaningful way. Each lamp is built from reclaimed vintage glass blocks rescued from New Zealand building demolitions -- glass originally cast in Germany in the 1970s and 80s. No two blocks are identical. Your lamp does not exist until you order it.
The base is handcrafted in New Zealand from sustainably sourced timber. The LED bar is rated for 50,000 hours. Five interchangeable colour lenses are included -- Circadian Red, Amber Glow, Cosmic Green, Serene Blue, and Neon Pink -- so the lamp adapts to different moods and occasions rather than locking you into a single light quality for its lifetime.
The price is higher than IKEA. But the comparison is not really between two lamps -- it is between a lamp you will replace in three years and a lamp you will keep.
Free shipping to Australia and New Zealand. Made to order in NZ.