Kodai Iwamoto

Eyes on Talents member, Tokyo-based designer Kodai Iwamoto, took part in Wallpaper*’s exhibition for Milan Design Week 2025. Titled Material Alchemists, the group exhibition brought together the work of 20 emerging designers and studios, each demonstrating a commitment to exploring materials in their practice. Kodai Iwamoto presented the Arrowfloor lamp, created using a traditional hammer-forming technique. The commonly used inexpensive aluminum extrusions are shaped into three-dimensional forms by manually hammering them against wooden molds. Through this process, Kodai Iwamoto aimed to combine the primitive method of stone tool production, passed down for thousands of years, with modern materials developed since the 20^th century, resulting in an object marked by a sense of tension and minimal beauty.