Mathmos, the inventor of the Lava Lamp, has opened its new showroom in Poole.

The company has been based in Poole since it was founded 60 years ago by Edward Craven-Walker.

In 1989, with Edward and his wife looking to retire, Cressida Granger began the process of taking over Mathmos (then Crestworth) with her business partner David Mulley, who she would later buy out of the business.

Cressida Granger and David Mulley in the 80s, around the time they started the takeover process of the company.

At the time, Cressida owned a stall in the Camden stables selling vintage kit from the 60s and 70s.

“I came across the Lava Lamp and started selling it,” she explained.

“They were popular but hard to buy, so we approached the inventor in the hopes of buying the formula to enable us to start manufacturing them ourselves.

“He said no, preferring us to come and run the business and buy it over time. We did a deal on the back of an envelope and they were true to their word.”

Since then, Cressida and the team at Mathmos have continued to innovate on the formula and product more generally.

One of the results of this innovation is the Saturn, which is the biggest production line Lava Lamp available.

The Saturn, the largest production line Lava Lamp available.

The Mathmos range spans from this, right down to much smaller lamps which work using tea lights, meaning they can be easily moved around.

“Over the last few years we’ve gone through a big packaging project to strip out as much as we can, as well as moving what we couldn’t over to recycled board.

“They’re also still made in Britain, meaning we’re not shipping them in from all over the world and because we sell direct to the consumer, they’re not moving from factory to shop to customer.”

One of the most important sustainability features of the Mathmos Lava Lamps is that they stock spares for all their products going right back to 1963.

The Mathmos Astro, the first Lava Lamp

“There’s no need for end of life if you can replace the parts. Even if you’ve decided you don’t want it you can sell it on. We don’t make for landfill, we make for life.”

This is also one of the functions of the new showroom, with Lava Lamp owners able to bring in faulty products for the team to look over and offer replacement parts for.

Customers can also browse the product range, with on-site etching available and discount offers only available in the showroom.

• https://mathmos.com/