A 12,000 square foot home in the Los Angeles area that doesn’t use incandescent bulbs can have lighting that fools a photographer. Christopher Thompson, founder of a lighting design company, Studio Lux, walked the photographer through a home in LA and showed alternatives to traditional lighting.
He explained that new pending federal regulations regarding incandescent lightbulbs “won’t negatively impact” homeowners or businesses. Christopher told me recently that he loves incandescent lights but lighting technology is rapidly changing. “14 percent of electrical use in the United States is residential while 18 percent is from commercial use. Changing lighting sources can conserve energy.”
Christopher’s projects take him from Palm Springs, California to the northwest and to the Middle East. We discussed how commercial buildings and homeowners can make greater use of natural lighting and he gave an example from a monastery in Oregon.
“I don’t think people understand the power of daylighting. At the Mt Angel Monastery, they let me in to the library, lit naturally, and I walked among the bookstacks. The way the daylight had been positioned I could read any book without artificial lighting.”
The library, said Christopher, was three stories high and daylight was channeled to reflect off surfaces inside.
Effective lighting for offices and homes isn’t just about producing greater quantities of light. He says it’s about proper positioning. For ATM cash machines at banks, he said the area is flooded with a great amount of wasted lighting.
“I can design a system to produce as much light, but without the light pollution.”
Click here to see the portfolio for Studio Lux.
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