The Home Crowd

The appropriately named “Sha-Do” lighting fixtures by designer Peter Buning create intricate and impressive patterns along your walls and ceilings with a clear/opaque or clear/solid differentiation of the Sconce-screen.. (Sconce-shade?, Lamp shade?)

Okay, I’m not sure how to define it, I just know it looks awesome.

How appropriate would the flame-themed wall sconce be for the auto afficianado in your life?

Now, I know what you’re thinking?  Can I get one to match my wife/girlfriend’s tramp stamp?  Well, check out the Sha-do site, as well as a few additional product lines.  However, they seem to have focused in on more geometric patterns, as well as a traditional labyrinth.  So you might wanna hold your breath on the dragonfly-inspired shaded sconce.

Check out these, and many more great designs at the Sha-do site – Link

Price: 299 Euros, so expect about 500$ each.  The ordering site here lists the U.S. distributors as Design Within Reach in most of the cities I looked at, but the Sha-do fixtures aren’t listed on their website, so you might want to give them a call if you’re serious about tracking these down.

Spotted at Curbly.

Brazilian mechanic Alfredo Moser has come up with an ingenious system of daylighting to keep down power bills.  And the shopping list is quite short.

• 2-liter plastic bottle (empty)
• Water (h2o, nice and clean)
• Film roll canister, to cover the bottle’s cap (might be hard to track down, who uses a film camera anymore?)

(Screengrab from the youtube clip, as their clips tend to disappear randomly)

Clever!  This of course, is only useful during the daytime, but I’m certain that puts a nice dent in the ol’ power bill.  It may not seem practical for most of us with attics.  But let’s keep in mind the old sheds you need a flashlight to visit at two in the afternoon, or that open-framed garage when the only natural light comes from your whirlybird roof vent (that spinning thing that squeaks and looks like a christmas ornament).  Of course, the water bottle technique would only be appropriate should you be really in need of light, AND money’s really tight.

They state that the bottles don’t cause the roof to leak, and I’m not certain about their waterproofing method.  But I do know this…. plastic melts.  Give it one simmering hot July afternoon, and I think the water bottle melts like that time you left your favorite CD on the dash of your car.  Maybe a thicker plastic container, say, from a juice container may hold up better.  But if you’re serious about natural daylighting, it’s best to do it right.

My suggestion?  Track down a natural daylighting system such as Solatube.

(Yeah, it’s pretty much what you’re thinking, the light comes in from above, and is routed downward via an ultra-reflective ductwork)

Not only will you cut down on that power bill, but you’ll enjoy bright, natural daylight in the darkest corners of your home, which would have otherwise been dark or unnaturally lit.  Also, installed correctly with it’s corresponding hardware (flashing, waterproofing),  and you don’t have any worries about leaks.  And feel good about saving energy, saving money, and on and on should this type of technology gets picked up in commercial buildings….bet that’d brighten up the ol’ supermarket.

Best of all – You’re home will appear to be co-piloted by R2-D2 himself!!!

Check out Solatube’s site and presentation here – Solatube

DIY, No Electricity lighting from 2 liter bottles from Lifehacker

Sometimes, I sit here and think “Ya know, I’d spend more time under the bed if not for the fact that it’s so hard to read any sort of books or magazines under there…”

Actually this image and the rest of the images of various furniture backlit by LED lighting here at Lifehacker are kind of enticing. If nothing else but for the fact that tomorrow I could drop by target or any other various electronic store and pick up a LED rope light strand. I spotted this one at amazon for about 60 bucks for 50 feet.

The smaller projects shown in the article use much less and manage to ‘pimp’ their furniture with roughly 20 linear feet of LED rope lights.

“Why don’t more people put lights under their beds?” you ask?  Well, fires quite simply.  Trying to light up the underside of your bed with traditional incandescent lights can be quite hot and dangerous when near combustibles.  And if you’re hooking up Fluorescent tube lights under your bed or desk, then you’re up for the hall of fame of geekdom.  LED lights are not nearly as hot, but instead warm to the touch, and while these may resemble your Christmas light knot-ball in the garage, they’re actually more dependable and much more energy efficient.

Unsightly speaker wires are just expected for those in apartments but it’s understood as it’s a temporary home. But FlatWire has another option for those tenants/homeowners looking to clean up the mess of wires without punch holes in your walls. And perhaps even that’s not an option sometimes. Perhaps you have shared walls between condo units you don’t wanna pierce, wall cavities full of spray foam insulation, or as in the case of many high rise apartments, a concrete wall.

(During Installation)

(After FlatWire is applied to walls, finished, and repainted over)

But what about folding the wires 90 degrees, just fold it upon itself. My big concern about this would be the heat generated by electrical cables as it is, but it seems to be directed at speakers, and low-voltage lighting, not providing the juice to that 500 watt home theater receiver, so I can’t imagine the paint or wallpaper bubbling itself off the wall. Seems like this may be useful for some of us, but just make sure you remember where you ran the FlatWire, so you don’t go and drive a nail through it years later while hanging a painting.

You can order it off their site, but it’s a little steep. 37$ for 25 feet of the speaker wire, or a home theater package for 250, plus their special adhesive, tape, labor (mudding, sanding, repainting or wallpapering if you choose)

Or you could just just run a wire, and paint over that. Sounds terrible, but you know you’ve seen it done before…

FlatWire (via Lifehacker)

Lifehacker also has a great post of “10 ways to get cables under control”, a how-to guide to keeping those cables under control and out of sight.