Max Gunawan, who founded Lumio, is clearly a fan of beautiful, warm lights — designs that are radiant and, as the company puts it, "delightful." First the company brought us a book-shaped light that could be folded and unfolded, acting like a literal revelation of light. Now Lumio is presenting its own speaker called Teno on Kickstarter.
Teno is shaped like a rock with a light crack in it and comes in two different colors: Arctic white or Lava black. The little line in the middle of the rock is there for a purpose. You gently open the rock and the Teno begins to play sound for you. Behold the beauty.
"Teno is several things at once," Lumio explains. "On its surface, it’s a beautifully crafted bowl sculpture made from natural sand. When cracked open, it comes alive; revealing soft, warm light that you can adjust with a simple tap. When fully open, it's a powerful speaker, releasing a rich sound that you control through touch."
A new kind of sound bowl —
The Teno is made up of resin and sand. Because of that texture, you get the impression of an actual rock. With the help of touch sensors, you'll be able to adjust the intensity of its light and sound. Just remember that the Teno is not your average light; it runs on 250 lumens and so will have a more ambient impression than a conventional brightness. The sound covers 50 to 200 square feet, according to The Verge. The speaker has Bluetooth capability, a battery that runs four hours at full level for light and eight hours for sound. One Teno costs $300.
Timeless beauty —
Gunawan explains that the Teno is intended to have a timeless perfection to it. The founder says that the speaker is the product of Gunawana's inspiration for kintsugi, the Japanese philosophy that emphasizes the art of putting broken things together as opposed to throwing them away. Kintsugi shows that objects have history and that history should be appreciated.
With that vision in mind, Gunawan says that the Teno speaker becomes "more beautiful with age." You tap the rock to increase the light and you stroke the rock up and down to adjust the volume. It's a lovely little bluetooth speaker that blends into your domestic background as if it's part of nature. Now, we'll let you decide if it's worth $300.
