15/08/2026
X MUSE INDUCTIVE
A bottle becomes a building.
A building becomes a body.
A staircase becomes a state of mind.
Painted across the surface of the X Muse bottle, the stair rises and descends simultaneouslyâits concave and convex rhythms recalling the cantilevered staircase leading to the crypt of Edwin Lutyensâs vast, unrealised cathedral for Liverpool, the only portion of his design to be built.
Yet these are not simply architectural steps.
In hypnotic induction, the staircase becomes an interior instrument: ten steps descending from the visible towards the invisible, from waking consciousness into trance. Each counted step loosens the gravity of the everyday. Each threshold opens onto another chamber of perception.
The X is both crossroads and Roman ten: the number of steps in the descent, and the Tenth Muse who gathers the other nine within her.
For what is a Muse if not a force that carries us outside ourselves?
The ultimate rapture is an altered stateâa moment in which inspiration becomes possession, architecture becomes consciousness, and the vessel contains not only a spirit, but a passage.
X MUSE INDUCTIVE, 2024
A piece conceived by Marcos Lutyens and Vadim de Grainville.
(Available on demand)
