The Modern Home
Lighting Problems
By BASIL IONIDES.
THERE is a good deal of science in lighting, and much research has been devoted to discovering how to obtain the
highest efficiency with the least cost and many other details, including which are the healthiest colours. Such science may be applied to shops, offices, hospitals and other institu- tions with great advantage, but in private houses individual taste will always be the determining factor. The lighting of a private house is essentially' wasteful, but to ensure comfort this is needed. For comfort in a house one needs light and shade, some parts being bright where needed for eating or reading, and some duller where one can get restful shadows. These tastes are not considered by the scientist, and until they arc the scientist will haVe little scope in home lighting. If he were to study what form of light makes humanity feel well and contented, what is best to read by, what to eat by, and so forth, a great service would be done and his exPeri- ments might be used, but economy and efficiency of light arc not the first consideration in the average home.
Although electric light has been available to most people for about forty years, it is only within the last few years that designers have been adventurous with fittings, and have demanded new forms of bulbs, &c. Until quite recently only the usual pear-shaped bulb could be obtained for general use, varied by the small candle light, but now one may get tubular lights of many sizes and forms. These have given the designers greater freedom and a great many interesting fittings and lighting effects are the consequence.
Most modern fittings look excellent when alight, but when out they are meaningless. As lights on an average are lit for only three to four hours out of the sixteen that rooms may be used, it is important that they should look well when out.; this should always be borne in mind by the decorator.
Modern lighting is divided into two main types—direct and indirect. For the latter one must have good reflecting surfaces of a pleasant colour : should the ceiling be the surface chosen, care must be taken that the feeling of being in a well is avoided: • This feeling often occurs where cornice lighting is employed, and it is very undesirable and depressing.
For comfort the best form of indirect lighting is down on to tables, but this entails having table lamps, with their flexes and plugs. Direct lighting is the most common form and the easiest to handle. Most fittings are designed for this form because the indirect lighting gives the designers small scope.
The most noticeable feature of modern fittings is the tre- mendous use of glass. It is usually white and what the layman calls ground glass ; in reality it is acided glass. This material is now made in many shapes—tubular, square, curved and so forth—and these forms are worked into endless arrangements set mostly in rustless steel or chromium-plated metal. Such fittings are excellent so far as they go, but the light they give is cold and very stern. For the comfort expected in a private house they are too bleak except for passages and bathrooms. Moreover, the glass is only obtain- able in stock shapes. To make new moulds is expensive, and so most designers have to remount existing ones in various ways in order to get their effects, and this not only limits their ambitions but produces a noticeable similarity in their work.
It will be found that most of the ultra modern fittings do not fulfil their real function. The light that they give makes a decorative object, either on the wall, on the table, or hanging, but does not illuminate the room as it should, so that several fittings will be needed where one of the right kind would do.
Furthermore, for private use the colour of the light is important, and most of the acid glass gives a dreary light, especially when mounted in steel or chromium plating. Gilt, copper and brass are far more suitable for fittings if a warm and comfortable light is needed, but they are not at the moment fashionable.
Many lovely effects can be and are obtained by flood or spot lights shining on to beautiful objects or surfaces, thus leading the eye to them. Light has an attraction and people will almost always look towards it. Any flood lighting that is used will be minimized if any bright light-points are seen in the foreground. A full effect is only obtained when the object is seen from the darker part of a room or passage on the principle that one cannot see from light into darkness, but only from darkness to light. It is a variation of this that makes cornice lighting ineffective where there is a plain ceiling with no interest. If there is a beautiful ceiling then there is a reason for it, but if the ceiling is plain one is making vision in the room a little difficult for nothing. The glare above makes objects below dim, Concealed light in the centre of a ceiling, however, if cleverly contrived, can be made to reflect on to the walls and pictures, so that they are well lighted and cast the light back on to the people and objects in the room. With this arrangement the feeling of being in a well is obviated.
Direct lighting from fittings that, display a strong light point will always detract from any objects in the room, as it is impossible to avoid the dazzle that stops vision, but where there are no decorative features the fittings may themselves be used as ornaments. There are, of course, the endless old fittings still pretending to be gas lights, lamps and candles. These are generally absurd, but sometimes almost inevitable in a period house, because modern fittings are too hard and " surgical-looking " for mellow surroundings.
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