Gabriel Ordeig Cole

London, 1954 — 1994

Gabriel Ordeig Cole, co-founder of Santa & Cole, was a multifaceted creator whose work blurred the boundaries between disciplines. His inventive spirit came through in lighting, interiors, essays, and graphic work—with a sharp, intuitive eye and a deep obsession with objects and with life lived at full tilt.

Born in London to a Catalan father and an English mother, Gabriel Ordeig Cole didn’t take the usual route into the worlds of design and interiors. He began studying Philosophy and Humanities, but eventually earned a degree in Fine Arts from East Ham College (1974) and Cardiff Arts School (1975–1978). His early professional ventures included work as an illustrator, music promoter through Free Difusión—a project he founded to energize Barcelona’s underground music scene in the 1970s—and assistant director in films by Salgot and Bigas Luna, where he discovered the power of lighting to shape atmosphere.

From there, he went on to design interiors and lighting for some of Barcelona’s most emblematic nightlife venues, including Boliche, La Xampanyeria, El Café del Sol, SíSíSí, and the cocktail bar Bijou. Then came the founding of Santa & Cole, where the editor finally came into his own.

At Santa & Cole, Gabriel was able for the first time to bring some of his designs into serial production, including the Colilla de Jardín, El Huevo de Colón, and La Bella Durmiente. He also used the platform to recover historic designs and produce reinterpretations of anonymous objects.

As an editor, Gabriel helped lay the groundwork for a new way of looking at design—one that valued meaning over authorship or fashion. He was an early advocate for a softer kind of lighting that stood apart from the metallic trend of the time, favoring wood, traditional parchment shades, reflected light, and color.

A regular writer on design, his passion is reflected in this line: “What remains intangible, mysterious, and elusive is no longer electricity—but light itself.”