Keeping the light on: Original BTC

Founded in 1990 by Peter Bowles, British manufacturer Original BTC now has six factories producing its bespoke lights. Each one specialises in fabricating different materials, such as hand-blown glass, moulded bone china and finely crafted metal. Peter is not only a pioneering entrepreneur — he was one of the first designers to recognise the appeal of modern industrial-style lighting — but over the years has saved established but struggling British factories from closure. A champion of British-made design, Peter has ensured these factories can continue to manufacture in the UK and has helped to protect many traditional crafts from extinction.

In some cases, it was Peter’s ingenuity and creative flair that led him to discover and consequently save factories. As the first designer to use bone china for lighting, he discovered a struggling tableware factory in Stoke-on-Trent that could make these light fittings, and so provided it with a new stream of income that ensured its survival.

In 2010 — by which time Peter’s son Charlie had become a company director — Original BTC acquired Davey Lighting, a marine lighting manufacturer founded in the 1880s. This prevented its takeover by a firm planning to outsource production to the Far East. The following year, Original BTC secured the future of glassworks English Antique Glass, the UK’s only remaining maker of flat glass, and metalworks Abbotts Manufacturing. Then in 2013, Beadlight, an Oxford-based LED lighting manufacturer — famous for engineering the world’s first LED reading light for commercial aircraft — became part of Original BTC’s burgeoning portfolio.

© Architonic