Vela Solid Walnut Full Length Mirror

Details

Vela rests on the floor and tips back against the wall, so afternoon light crosses it at an angle instead of hitting it flat. Follow the frame upward and it swells into a rounded lobe near the top, pulls in tight around the middle, then opens again into a long closed oval down at the floor. There is no straight run anywhere along the outline and no corner, so the eye keeps traveling instead of stopping at an edge.

The two sides are not doing the same thing. The left edge travels inward in one long unbroken curve and, at the point where it presses deepest, the frame swells into a sculpted mass nearly as wide as the glass beside it. The right edge answers at the same height with a softer, shallower dip. That single move gives Vela its cinched waist and divides what you see into a generous upper field, a narrow band across the middle, and a second open field at your feet.

Honey-toned, and even from top to base

The color sits in the light end of the range, honey through to pale gold, and it holds that tone the whole way up without a heavy passage or a busy one. The figure stays quiet, so the shape reaches you before the surface does, which is what you want from an object this sculptural. Finish is decided per order, so it can be taken warmer or left as it is here.

The waist is also where the making shows. Frame width changes as the outline travels, thick and blocklike at the pinch, easing back to a lighter band around the upper lobe, and the section is rounded over the whole way, with no sharp edge anywhere. A face wrapped over a form cannot follow a curve that bends in two directions at once, which is why this is cut from solid stock. The glass drops into a channel inside the wood and its inner edge tracks the outer contour exactly, so the depth of the frame registers before the reflection does.

Mehmet Ali, and the order that starts the work

Every Vela is shaped by Mehmet Ali, in Konya, who has more than thirty-five years of wood behind him and still does the cutting and shaping himself. The mirrors themselves are only two years old; the workshop behind them is a great deal older.

Nothing is prepared ahead of time. Yours is started once you order it, at the height and in the finish you ask for, and it will carry the tone and markings of the boards it was cut from rather than repeating these photographs exactly.

Picking a height

Nine sizes, from 75 x 29 cm (29 x 11 inch) up to 225 x 88 cm (88 x 34 inch). The first figure is the height. The proportion holds steady across the range, so Vela reads as far taller than it is wide at every size. The shorter ones sit well beside a console or in a corner of an entryway; from 175 x 68 cm (69 x 26 inch) upward you get a full standing view with a step or two of room behind you. In these photographs it stands propped against the wall.

Getting it to you, and living with it

So far these pieces have gone out to around twenty countries. Yours is wrapped in protective material and sent worldwide with a tracking number. Keep the wood away from damp and dust it with a soft dry cloth. If you are stuck between two heights, write to us with the wall you have in mind, we would rather work it out together than leave you guessing.

Vela sits in the walnut full length range, where the darker end is easy enough to find. Elara works the same waisted idea in deep red-brown and satin, and carries more width down at the base. Milan goes the other way: four upright sides, matte, the wave kept to the edges.