The Simple Gift of Light #4 Light can help you move with energy…and perform brilliantly all day long, no matter what you do. Sometimes I feel a bit like a huckster selling a miracle elixir when I talk about the benefits light can bring to our lives. I picture myself standing in a dusty wooden […]
Category: Bedrooms & Bathrooms
Wake Gently

The Simple Gift of Light #3 Would you like to wake gently each morning, refreshed and ready for the new day? Light can help you. A few years ago I caught some kind of nasty cough, the kind that gets worse when lying horizontal (so much for sleep), and it just wouldn’t go away. For […]
GIVING The Simple Gift of Light

Introducing a second new series for 2025 focused on practical advice for designers. Today I start a second new series for the year that I hope will make a strong compliment to the first. Last week I started the Simple Gift of Light series as a place to explore several key benefits of light in […]
The Simple Gift of Light

Introduction to a new series for 2025…and beyond? Light, to me, is the first divine gift of the universe. In the middle of a career centered on light, I have more questions than answers, despite knowing more than ever before. Why, for example, do so many people suffer from light that hurts as much as […]
Free Lighting Design: Worthless?

We recently lost a potential client to a manufacturer who offered “free” lighting design services (so long as you purchased fixtures from them, of course, which have the cost of service buried into the sale price). My first reaction was indignation but, as is often the case, a closer look revealed a much more nuanced […]
The Circle of Light

Not all that is new in lighting is much better. One of the newest trends in architectural and residential lighting is tubes of light about 1” in diameter. When I started my career a rather good number of years ago, we called these T8 Fluorescent Tubes, and they were universally loathed for their institutional feel. […]
We Need Commercialized Lighting Design.

Lately I have heard others describe my work and the work of my company as “not as good” as some others. They are right. That is my goal. I suspect that the average citizen, when asked to describe the work of an architect, might wander into descriptions of skyscrapers and art museums. Frank Gehry, Zaha […]
Fine Homebuilding Downlight Guide

Fine Homebuilding Magazine is a well-crafted publication focused on the craft of building better and I was honored to be included for my fourth article with them. This time, I focused on products more than applications, a bit of a departure for me and a fun exercise. The result is an 8-page guide to recessed […]
DON’T/DO THIS: Bedrooms for Children

My wife and I use our bedroom for sleeping, getting dressed in the morning, and a few other things I won’t mention. Our children, over the course of the past twenty-plus years, have used their bedrooms for sleeping, dressing, and nearly every other activity imaginable. At different times in their lives, our children have read books, built […]
Don’t/Do This: Primary Bedrooms (Modern)

This post is a continuation of my Don’t/Do This: Primary Bedroom exploration. My Don’t/Do This series are a lot of fun to sketch and imagine. Too much fun, perhaps, as the post on primary bedrooms has now ballooned into three. Without much forethought, I find myself creating an increasingly comprehensive series aimed at comparing and contrasting what to do […]