A Light Song of Light

At Casa Ysasi, we’ve long been drawn to the Light and Space movement and to artists like Robert Irwin, who expanded what light and space could mean within an environment. Their work taught us that perception itself could be a medium. Yet what we often felt was missing was the spirit music brings — the sense that art is not only about structure or perception, but about pursuing a feeling.

Music was our first entry point into art, and we try to carry that same sense of discovery into the objects we make. For us, the goal has always been emotional before anything else. When we began collaborating with Postmodern Tectonics on Musical Furniture, the project seemed to hold that intention naturally, without needing explanation.

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We’ve always felt that music and light speak the same language. Both arrive through emotion first. Both shape a room without asking for attention.

There’s a book we return to often, A Light Song of Light by Kei Miller, which traces this relationship between music and light with quiet force:

A light song of light is not sung in the light; what would be the point?

A light song of light swells up in dark times…

It hums a small tune in daytime, but saves its full voice for midnight.

Miller’s writing moves between song and poetry, light and darkness, drawing from folklore, history, and lived experience. It reminds us that music can be a guide toward light, especially in uncertain moments. This project began as an attempt to give that idea a physical form.

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Our admiration for the hi-fi world grew slowly, through listening, and through noticing how sound gathers people. Musical Furniture emerged from that space of observation, in conversation with Postmodern Tectonics, as a question rather than a product: what if furniture could participate in music?

The first piece, Case Study 01, is a marine plywood credenza reduced to what is essential. Its proportions are tuned not for spectacle, but for use: vinyl DJing, repetition, touch, and pause. Every dimension responds to the choreography behind the booth.

As the form developed, the idea of the hearth kept returning — a center, a place people naturally orient themselves toward. Casa Ysasi introduced light as fire: a warm yellow glow made from traditional amate paper, held within the structure. The light doesn’t dominate. It breathes.

When a record plays, the piece gathers the room. At a dinner table, during a small set, between tracks, it creates a shared gravity. We think of it as a contemporary fireplace for analog music lovers.

This work began over a year ago and unfolded through attention to small details that are often overlooked: where the headphones rest while searching for the next record, where a sleeve waits while the track spins, how cables can exist without chaos, where a glass can land without interrupting the moment.

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In the near term, we’re shaping a thoughtful response to the traditional DJ booth — one that feels equally at home in living rooms and clubs. Over time, the project opens into a collection of parts: pieces that can be combined, adapted, and lived with.

This is less about furniture, and more about the spaces music creates.

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