About Us

The Story

Mnuca was born out of a passion for merging technology with natural, sustainable materials. The first product from Mnuca is a floating lamp that lights up when floating, and turns off when resting. Encouraging playful interactivity was at the core of the design philosophy when developing the lamp, transforming the passive everyday task of turning on a lightbulb into something fun. 

Each lamp is crafted from FSC certified sustainably sourced birch plywood, this wood features beautiful flowing patterns in the grain, reminiscent of drizzling Manuka honey, hence the name Mnuca.

In 2021 we successfully raised over £6,000 on Kickstarter, this funded the investment needed for our initial production run of around 100 lamps. 

 

The Studio

Mnuca is based in a studio in Brighton, UK, this is where the product design, prototyping, and manufacturing takes place. Manufacturing locally reduces the carbon footprint of each lamp as it avoids the need to ship the lamps from a foreign manufacturer to a local distribution centre. It also means that product quality can be monitored very closely and without any delay. The studio currently consists of 3 laser cutters, a belt sander, and a very worn out coffee machine.

 

The Team

Hi, my name's Oli, I'm a robotics engineer and a product designer. Yep, at the moment it's just me! My background includes 3.5 years as a Senior Robotics Engineer at Dyson, and running a small Etsy Shop on the side. I left Dyson in 2021 to focus full time on building Mnuca. My full background can be seen here.