1THING: Plug In Bedroom Lighting

A silhouetted figure reading on a bed in a bedroom. There is a ceiling fan on the ceiling and a table across the room on the other side of the image. The ceiling fan has a light. A big, bright arrow points from the light to the face of the figure. White text near the light reads "this light can hurt you" and points with a thin, white arrow to the ceiling fan light. Script text below the image reads "How to make a bedroom more comfortable..."

When it comes to plug-in lighting upgrades in the bedroom, the bedside table lamp is a runaway favorite. Both useful and ubiquitous, this staple of decorative lighting needs no introduction. And devoting an entire blog post to them might be considered a waste of time. That means I will probably write about bedside lamps someday, […]

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1THING: New Build Bedrooms

An illustrated depiction of a bedroom featuring a bed fit for two, two lamps on either side, and a ceiling fan. Script text at the bottom reads "Lamps are great...but usually not enough."

I am having fun with both 1THING series, and this week’s post on bedrooms is no exception. I am pretty good at overcomplicating things, so the mental gymnastics of forcing myself to make a single choice is proving to be good exercise. Plus, I think I might quit my job so I can just sketch and doodle […]

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1THING: Plug In Bathroom Lighting

HOW TO GET NIGHTLIGHTS TO BE THE RIGHT LIGHTS. Next to a red arrow pointing up: light going this way shines in our eyes disrupting our sleep Next to a green arrow pointing down: light going this way shines on the floor making it safer

It is particularly difficult to change lighting in a bathroom without hiring an electrician. Most baths are filled with tubs, showers, toilets, and vanities that leave little to no room for tables and lamps. And plug-in lamps near a tub are a bad idea from a safety perspective – electricity near water is a time-honored […]

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Exposure: A Better Bath

A photograph of small circular lighting fixtures in a shower stall.

  In the fourth and final SMART LIGHTING SERIES video from Wipliance, Lee and I take a quick bathroom break to explore the Light Can Help You approach to lighting. We push back against common trends like downlights over the sink and vanity lights over the mirror to deliver a better experience. We also use a […]

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1THING: New Build Baths

A CAD illustration of a bathroom featuring a large, circular bathtub in the middle of the room with sinks and vanities on the walls framing the tub. On the far wall is a shower stall.

In retrospect, perhaps I should have saved this post for Halloween. Why? Because I attempted to illustrate light on the human face and ended up creating ghosts. I was never very good at drawing faces, well, honestly, I was never ANY good at drawing faces. But since faces are the reason we have mirrors over […]

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Bedrooms: Beyond Sleeping

An illustration of a bedroom with lighting dos on the left and lighting donts on the right.

We have a certain number of formulas for illuminating a bedroom. We layer in lighting to deliver our five promises of light in these rooms just as we would anywhere else in the home. The solutions are different in a bedroom than in a kitchen because the function and form of each space is vastly […]

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Sorry, Mom.

An overhead light that has a gold base and tip, and a textured clear glass globe

My mother has carefully and meticulously curated a style for the family farmhouse over the past 45 years of residency (we’ve had the farm since about 1882, but none of us remember that). In the 1970’s and 80’s when I was growing up it was, well, very 1970’s. Then, when we finally all went off […]

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Lighting Malady: 4CnF Syndrome

A yellow triangular warning sign with a lightbulb symbol and crossbones below it.

The most common lighting malady I diagnose is CFLS, or Ceiling Fan Light Syndrome.  Statistically speaking (and I am completely making this up), CFLS affects three of every four Americans at some point in their lives.  If you or someone you know is suffering from CFLS, please contact your designer immediately. One common side effect […]

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Long Nights Need Better Lights

A bedroom with a ceiling fan, several large pieces of art on the wall, and a low wide chest of drawers with a lamp on it. There are two lamps on either side of the bed.

My latest Houzz article shares four ways to brighten up these long, dark nights at home.  I forgot to add that wearing an LED headlamp might also help, but anyone who lives with you will get very annoyed.  On second thought, stick with the four options in the article.  Click on the image below, and […]

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Light Can Help You