The real thing
Neon in glass, bent by hand
NEON LIGHT
Glass, gas and fire
A glass tube, heated over a flame and bent by hand in our workshop in Al Quoz, then filled with neon or argon gas and lit by electricity. That's the whole technology, and it hasn't meaningfully changed in a century.
It glows in every direction at once, so it throws colour onto the wall behind it rather than pointing at you. The glass comes from New York. The transformers come from California and Italy.
One tube, one piece, no two the same — including two of the same design.
The details
Neon in glass
A glass tube, bent by hand over a flame, filled with gas and lit by electricity. Priced per design, by the number of bends.
From
AED 2,800
A design deposit of AED 500
Starting a commission
We used to draw glass commissions for free. Drawing one properly means working out every bend, every join, where the electrodes sit, which colours exist in real gas and which don't — and then telling you honestly what the glass will and won't hold.
So there's a deposit. AED 500, credited in full against your commission.
Every glass piece we make is a commission. We don't hold stock in traditional Neon in glass.
It glows in every direction
360 degrees of light off the tube, washing the wall behind it. No LED does this, and anyone who has seen both can tell in a second.
No two are identical
Every tube is shaped by hand, so even two pieces of the same design differ. You own the only one of yours
It can be repaired, forever
A broken tube gets re-bent and refilled by the person who made it. An LED at the end of its life has to be remade.
Glass neon comes with no warranty. It's hand-made, and it's glass, and we'd rather say that here than bury it in small print. What it comes with instead is us: if a tube breaks, we re-bend it and refill it. Tell us what happened and we'll quote the repair.
It goes outside, too.
The connections are sealed with silicone caps so rain can't reach them. Neon glass has been lighting terraces and frontages for a hundred years.
Installation
We come and hang it.
In the UAE, your piece is installed by the people who made it. We bring it, place it, set the clips, position the transformer, and leave the wall looking like the piece grew there.
That isn't a courtesy. Glass is at its most vulnerable in the ten minutes it goes up — the clips have to sit in the right places, the tube can't be stressed, and the transformer needs somewhere sensible to live. Hanging it yourself is the single easiest way to break something that took days to bend.
Saudi and Qatar we deliver by road, packed by us, with the mounting points marked so whoever puts it up knows where the load goes.
Most people want LED, and that's fine
Not sure glass is the one?
Neon gas burns red-orange. Argon reads as ice blue. Everything else in the palette comes from coloured tubing and phosphor coatings inside the glass — which is why a glass piece has a depth of colour that's hard to describe until you're standing in front of one.
A lot of people who come looking for neon end up with LED flex or Acrylic LED. It costs less, it's safe around children, it hangs in ten minutes and it ships worldwide.
We make all three in one studio, so we have no reason to push you toward the wrong one.
Compare all three material
Sharing the glow
Our love for neon doesn’t stop with what we make. At Vertical, we host the only neon workshop in the region, a place where anyone can experience the fire, the bending, the magic. Because art isn’t just something to look at. It’s something to feel.
Discover our services
Custom NEON & LED
Inifinity Mirror
360 chandelier
Art Commission & Consultancy