I've had the BenQ WiT reading desk lamp for nearly five years, and it has been almost flawless until now. I always use it to light my desk when working on the computer, and it's also fine for any detail work or whenever I'm reading on the desk. It could be improved with some design changes to reduce lateral glare, but this could impact the wide throw of the light which entirely covers my desk.
Lamps are a fantastic way to light an interior space. Recessed ceiling lights do not establish hierarchy in the dimensions that humans are most interested in. Getting the lighting source close to eye level is the key to success.
At some level this turns into an accessibility and comfort issue. People with limited vision can take strong advantage of well placed lights. Highlights and shadows are some of the most fundamental elements of human visual perception. Without them our brain needs to work overtime to analyze a given scene.
As a former lighting designer, we would call this “task lighting” and you are completely correct. Generally speaking, task lighting is MUCH more pleasant that simply relying on overhead lights, recessed or otherwise.
I know this is like saying "I could do what Jackson Pollock does if I just threw some paint around"...but I can't really shake the feeling that that Muuto Post looks like something out of my dorm room but for 1255 dollars.
I guess the modularity (you can purchase more lights) is a real feature though?
I'll note that many of the glass blocks they use are available all over, for a few dollars. I bought a few Doric glass blocks, stuck some diffused LED strips below them, and printed a stand/enclosure, all for under $15. Good gift for friends.
These look quite nice. I'm very protective of desk real estate for persistent things, though. Has anyone got a nice bright focus lamp when working on things. Most of the time my room is well-enough illuminated for things, but yesterday I was doing some minor maintenance on my 3d printer hot-end and I had to use my iPhone with the flashlight on propped up. Is there some kind of compact folding lamp which nonetheless has the ability to hold position and still be moved over specific parts of my table? Battery-operated would be ideal, but I can plug things in at worst.
I use an Anduril based LED headlamp running rechargable 18650 battery.[0]
Light where you look, as stable as your head, brightness variable as desired.
Anduril firmware can run in simple mode or get stupid complicated with things like candle, lightning, tactical flashing (think flashbang level of trying to disorient).
Milwaukee 500 Lumens LED Pivoting REDLITHIUM USB Flashlight.
Google that. It's pretty expensive for a flashlight but makes a PHENOMENAL work light. 3 brightness/focus modes, magnetic base, adjustable head, holds charge forever, and rechargable.
Since you’re a fan of Sapper, have you peeped the Halley? He did it for an LED lighting startup (back when that was a thing), very artsy for him. I got one on eBay several years ago that I use as a work lamp because of its supreme adjustability. Uses my favorite electromechanical connector of all time, the 3.5mm audio jack (I’ve used it on every one of my hardware products).
One lamp featured was a "mini Tizio". I bought the full-size one many, many years ago. (E.g. uses a Halogen bulb.) This article prompted me to think... So I just Goolged it. My vintage Tizio is now selling for about $1,200. (Cannot remember what I spent, but very likely my <$150 filter kicked in when buying.) So if you like these lights, maybe consider the cost an investment. If after a few decades you may want to sell, and you might do well. Note: My Tizio is not for sale as it is a superb desk lamp.
Alas, a good-condition Tizio usually sells for around $200-$350 used, depending on the exact model. First-generation models may go a little higher, like $500-$600. I bought mine a couple of years ago for about €250.
If you browse sites like 1stdibs or Pamono, you're going to see dramatically inflated prices, but I don't see why anyone would ever buy there. Ebay, Selency, Vntg, etc. are more likely to sell at actual market prices.
I sold a few vintage Tizio lamps, with the old style halogen, for €130 per piece last year. Took a few weeks to sell them. In all fairness, they were missing bits like the glass panel and one had two paint splatters on the head.
Nice lights, but not the easiest to move, a bit fragile and not very power efficient. The LED ones don't power on when you apply power to them which is a strange choice and makes it difficult to integrate with wall switches.
The real price of anything you see on 1stdibs is about 40-50 percent lower than what you see. Their fees are egregious and if a piece is unique or the seller name has enough info it's almost always very easy to find the seller and contact them directly via instagram. Also, if you want more market price information go look at sold prices on liveauctioneers (just keep in mind buyers premium is about 25-30 percent)
Remember a saying of 5 individual light sources in each room as a rule of interior design. Very wholesome read, made me smile and look at my own lamps.
I have lamp sockets – need to rewire lamps to a different kind of plug but then they can be turned on/off with ordinary light switches. They were more common in older properties when lamps were more common, then went out of fashion, though some newer (or more expensive) properties get them these days.
I don't know how honeywell of all companies is selling this, but I figure they have engineers that they turned loose on and got out of their way.
It is just super nice. Elegant looking, not expensive, very high quality illumination that can get bright, smoothly dimmable with a knob. a knob to adjust lighting is a good design.
In comparison, dyson makes a lamp that is the same kind of interesting genre, but they cost 10-20x.
[1] except to turn it off is inelegant - you have to press and hold instead of tap, because tap changes color temperature.
The knob is such an underrated part of this. For something you adjust constantly, a physical rotary control is just better than tapping through presets or opening an app
I have a similar lamp that also makes you press and hold. Annoying. Yours even has that knob (mine is all touch) -- it should just have a physical detent at the end that cuts power, you know, like lots of dimmable lamps used to have.
The ones that clamp to your desk are no good. The clamp always works its way loose. I drilled a hole in the desk and ran a bolt through it, that works.
My articulating desk lamp was balanced for incandescent bulbs. The LED ones are heavier and pull it down.
The Tizio ones, despite certainly desirable due to Sapper, are crap. Suffer from contact issues and the earlier halogen ones love to overheat. I used to refurbish them for people.
Love the pics. Moved into a place in the 90's. Insurance agent told me, easiest way to liven up a cheap apt was to get good lighting. He was right, but I was too lazy to shop much. Only found one lamp that I really like.
It's an Ikea Torchère: kinda old now, just halogen, but I've always kept a spare "bulb" for it somewhere - replaced it every 10-20 years. I still like the weird pattern on the ceiling. :P
Really loved the lamps featured here. I'm jealous of the whole setup, including the Vitsoe shelving. Saving this for inspiration when I need to revamp my home setup. Thanks for sharing!
The picture just below the title "Tizio Micro" looking down on the lamp with the lawn behind, part of the collage of five photos, has been squished horizontally or stretched vertically quite a lot. Many of the other photos on the page have also been stretched in one direction but not the other.
Oh those, are vertically shot ones! They are not thinned. Their composition are like that. When you press/click on them you should be able to see them in full page. They look nice on the phone, but on your desktop/ipad (depending on the orientation) it might look bad yeah.
What a wonderful space you have created. I have so much mindlessness in where I have things placed. I feel inspired to be a bit more purposeful and organize some things now.
I noticed a Toyooka Craft box in the article (on the "Louis Poulsen PH 3/2" pic), and thought "fountain pen user."
This article about their setup mentions fountain pens.
I share the author's love for nice lamps. A lamp is an object to enjoy every day, which doesn't require any time investment from us. It is just there, with one simple function: to look pleasing.
Had to look it up. The cable coming out of the middle section is unfortunate. I get it's supposed to be vaguely anthropomorphic so that's like a tail or something but... come on.
How does it fare with modern LED bulbs? I imagine the placement of the reflectors assumes an almost-point source of light like a filament would provide, but most LED bulbs now have a plane of LEDs inside a frosted shell.
I guess would it make a noticeable difference to put an LED faux filament bulb in here? Or is it just not as fussy as I'm imagining?
Indeed. Having such nice lamps and or items is especially nice when you put them in a nice interior with everything perfectly finished. Put them in a messy place and or a less than perfect place and you lose a lot of the wow effect. Great place and great lamps here, congratulations to OP !
I fantasized about the possibilities of decorating a place, when said decorations do not need to be proofed against wanton destruction by young children
I love love love my vintage table lamps, they're "Peill Puztler" ice cube lamps I think. They were typically sold back in the days with mirror head bulbs: I know because I was there, as a kid, and my mom (RIP) had those in her apartment. And now I've got them at my place.
And because I hate to have only LED lighting, I stick good old (but brand new) incandescent bulbs in my "ice cube" lamps: such bulbs go by many names and can still be found (they're either for ovens [where they can sustain insane heat], for warming terrariums, for heating lava lamps, etc.).
Just having one or two incandescent bulb in the living room, in addition to LEDs, works wonder to give a cozy ambiance.
I'd say it's a bit sad to have lamps from the 70s but then stick cold LED bulbs into them (and, yes, even "warm" LEDs do feel incredibly cold): put incandescent bulbs and experience them at they were meant to be (once again: no need to replace the entire house with incandescent bulbs, just two or three here and there shall work wonder).
If your warm LEDs feel too cold, they’re not warm LEDs. Most ‘warm’ LEDs are either 3000K or 2700K, which is about the colour temperature of a standard incandescent at full brightness.
Look for 2200K LEDs – they’re actually warm and closer to a dimmed incandescent. I personally prefer 1800K, which are warmer still, but they’re much harder to find and have far fewer options in terms of brightness.
> Fun fact: “Akari” means light in Japanese, both as illumination and as lightness.
Wow! I love it when two languages have matching homonyms. I always wonder "what does it mean ?". Like, in English "second" to mean the unit of time and the place after "first" feels like two distinct usages. But it's the same in Spanish ("segundo"), which points to a deeper connection (and isn't so unsurprising given the shared roots of the languages): the unit of time is called that because it's the second subdivision of an hour.
The two usages of "light" in English are so distinct I'm quite surprised it's like this in the entirely unrelated Japanese language. Is this just a big coincidence, or does anyone know any deeper reasons here?
For the benefit of other readers, this is (to my deep chagrin) just a coincidence. Some other fun false friends (i.e. w/ no actual etymological connection), some sillier than others:
- そう sō, "so"
- 名前 namae, "name"
- 乱暴 rambō, "violence"
- 被る kaburu, "cover"
- 孫 son, "descendant"
- 銭 sen, "one hundredth of a yen" (sounds similar to "cent")
The first example is not really a coincidence: a second is defined by being the second subvision of an hour.
So that example fails to support any reason for akari matching light in English. But for the sake of argument here is another one: じゃり (giari, read as "ja-ri") in Japanese means gravel and in my dialect almost the same sound (giarin, "ja-ri-n") also mean gravel. Go figure.
That was exactly my intended point (and my comment does mention the hour subdivision). There are a lot of meaningless coincidental homonyms, but these tend to not be homonyms in other languages. E.g. I dunno "left" in English would be "izquierda" or "dejó". Or conversely, "vino" in Spanish would be "wine" or "came". The fact that "second" and "segundo" have homonyms in their respective languages is a clue that the unit of time and the ordinal word are the same is not a coincidence. And when you look into it it's for the reason that you state. The homonym pairs indicates an etymological relationship between the two concepts.
So I was wondering if the same applied here. My initial reaction is that "light" meaning "illuminated" and "light" meaning "not heavy" is that this is just one of those coincidences, since I can't see how that one word relates the two concepts. But given that Japanese also does the same, it makes me wonder if maybe there is some sort of relationship. Maybe it was a common belief historically that the sun was not very heavy or something like that. Or maybe not and it's just a rare double coincidence!
At least some of these cases occur because the two concepts are related by metaphor, and cultures behind each language independently followed the same path of metaphorical expansion.
Wait until you look up the many ways 分 (usually bun in compounds, but used to spell the verb wakaru) is used. (There are also more complex variants of the kanji that emphasize various nuances.)
I've had the BenQ WiT reading desk lamp for nearly five years, and it has been almost flawless until now. I always use it to light my desk when working on the computer, and it's also fine for any detail work or whenever I'm reading on the desk. It could be improved with some design changes to reduce lateral glare, but this could impact the wide throw of the light which entirely covers my desk.
I'd like to know the author's light bulb preferences
It’s almost entirely Philips Hue’s in my Room. The rest is scattered. They are all warm kelvin bulbs.
I like all those cute little home decor items, too.
But honestly, I'd love for the entire ceiling to be one controllable light source. That would be perfect.
Lamps are a fantastic way to light an interior space. Recessed ceiling lights do not establish hierarchy in the dimensions that humans are most interested in. Getting the lighting source close to eye level is the key to success.
At some level this turns into an accessibility and comfort issue. People with limited vision can take strong advantage of well placed lights. Highlights and shadows are some of the most fundamental elements of human visual perception. Without them our brain needs to work overtime to analyze a given scene.
As a former lighting designer, we would call this “task lighting” and you are completely correct. Generally speaking, task lighting is MUCH more pleasant that simply relying on overhead lights, recessed or otherwise.
I love iconic minimal lamps too. I never saw the Lampe de Bureau nor the Kismas Lamp 01, love them! You might like the Muuto Post.
I know this is like saying "I could do what Jackson Pollock does if I just threw some paint around"...but I can't really shake the feeling that that Muuto Post looks like something out of my dorm room but for 1255 dollars.
I guess the modularity (you can purchase more lights) is a real feature though?
I'll note that many of the glass blocks they use are available all over, for a few dollars. I bought a few Doric glass blocks, stuck some diffused LED strips below them, and printed a stand/enclosure, all for under $15. Good gift for friends.
These look quite nice. I'm very protective of desk real estate for persistent things, though. Has anyone got a nice bright focus lamp when working on things. Most of the time my room is well-enough illuminated for things, but yesterday I was doing some minor maintenance on my 3d printer hot-end and I had to use my iPhone with the flashlight on propped up. Is there some kind of compact folding lamp which nonetheless has the ability to hold position and still be moved over specific parts of my table? Battery-operated would be ideal, but I can plug things in at worst.
I use an Anduril based LED headlamp running rechargable 18650 battery.[0]
Light where you look, as stable as your head, brightness variable as desired.
Anduril firmware can run in simple mode or get stupid complicated with things like candle, lightning, tactical flashing (think flashbang level of trying to disorient).
Good luck with that 3D printer hotend!
[0] https://www.sofirnlight.com/products/sofirn-h35r-1500lm-head...
*can also use the light it self to recharge the battery within.
Milwaukee 500 Lumens LED Pivoting REDLITHIUM USB Flashlight.
Google that. It's pretty expensive for a flashlight but makes a PHENOMENAL work light. 3 brightness/focus modes, magnetic base, adjustable head, holds charge forever, and rechargable.
I thought we were taking aesthetics into consideration.
I got a rechargeable headlamp for close work.
Since you’re a fan of Sapper, have you peeped the Halley? He did it for an LED lighting startup (back when that was a thing), very artsy for him. I got one on eBay several years ago that I use as a work lamp because of its supreme adjustability. Uses my favorite electromechanical connector of all time, the 3.5mm audio jack (I’ve used it on every one of my hardware products).
One lamp featured was a "mini Tizio". I bought the full-size one many, many years ago. (E.g. uses a Halogen bulb.) This article prompted me to think... So I just Goolged it. My vintage Tizio is now selling for about $1,200. (Cannot remember what I spent, but very likely my <$150 filter kicked in when buying.) So if you like these lights, maybe consider the cost an investment. If after a few decades you may want to sell, and you might do well. Note: My Tizio is not for sale as it is a superb desk lamp.
Alas, a good-condition Tizio usually sells for around $200-$350 used, depending on the exact model. First-generation models may go a little higher, like $500-$600. I bought mine a couple of years ago for about €250.
If you browse sites like 1stdibs or Pamono, you're going to see dramatically inflated prices, but I don't see why anyone would ever buy there. Ebay, Selency, Vntg, etc. are more likely to sell at actual market prices.
I sold a few vintage Tizio lamps, with the old style halogen, for €130 per piece last year. Took a few weeks to sell them. In all fairness, they were missing bits like the glass panel and one had two paint splatters on the head.
Nice lights, but not the easiest to move, a bit fragile and not very power efficient. The LED ones don't power on when you apply power to them which is a strange choice and makes it difficult to integrate with wall switches.
The real price of anything you see on 1stdibs is about 40-50 percent lower than what you see. Their fees are egregious and if a piece is unique or the seller name has enough info it's almost always very easy to find the seller and contact them directly via instagram. Also, if you want more market price information go look at sold prices on liveauctioneers (just keep in mind buyers premium is about 25-30 percent)
Thanks for the correct info. I must admit to a very hasty Google search, and the highest number likely caught my eye.
I wrote about this concept recently. Secondhand objects can be good purchases!
https://arun.is/blog/pinned-value-goods/
Excellent collection, compliments to the chef!
One of my recent favourites - Le Soleil by Foscarini - https://www.foscarini.com/en/product/le-soleil-std-s-en/
It's wonderfully asymmetrical without overdoing it, with every layer suspended and swaying independently when prodded. Exceptional light distribution.
Remember a saying of 5 individual light sources in each room as a rule of interior design. Very wholesome read, made me smile and look at my own lamps.
Brought me joy as Kondo would have said
All I can think about is the 20m it would take to walk around the house and turn all of them off every time I wanted to leave the house.
I have lamp sockets – need to rewire lamps to a different kind of plug but then they can be turned on/off with ordinary light switches. They were more common in older properties when lamps were more common, then went out of fashion, though some newer (or more expensive) properties get them these days.
phillips hue
Yeap! All of them are Phillips Hue bulbs and switches.
Does that then mean the switches can't be used?
Bah... how pedestrian. Wago or bust!
Homekit wall plugs
Doesn't work on the Tizio unfortunately
I appreciate that he has several lamps with glare-reduction features. I wish more of my lights were like that.
I have a lamp I really really like¹:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D5LS2KQW
I don't know how honeywell of all companies is selling this, but I figure they have engineers that they turned loose on and got out of their way.
It is just super nice. Elegant looking, not expensive, very high quality illumination that can get bright, smoothly dimmable with a knob. a knob to adjust lighting is a good design.
In comparison, dyson makes a lamp that is the same kind of interesting genre, but they cost 10-20x.
[1] except to turn it off is inelegant - you have to press and hold instead of tap, because tap changes color temperature.
> I don't know how honeywell of all companies is selling this
Not really the Honeywell. I tracked the lamp maker down at honeywellsmartlighting.com.
Honeywell International is licensing out the name, according to https://honeywellsmartlighting.com/pages/about-us
Yes, and I believe all consumer products with the Honeywell name are made by other companies that just license the trademark.
Honeywell air filters are Helen of Troy, Honeywell thermostats are Resideo, Honeywell lighting is Huo Ming Technology Guangdong, etc.
Good find, very interesting.
I wonder how that deal works, if and what kind of vetting Honeywell does before products are released.
I would imagine when the name is licensed, they would like to keep an eye on the type and quality of products the licensee puts out on the market
The knob is such an underrated part of this. For something you adjust constantly, a physical rotary control is just better than tapping through presets or opening an app
I got 3 of those for my workplace. They're nice. I assume Honeywell is just a brand.
Honeywell is famous for thermostats, but they do air filters and aerospace APUs and engines. I did not know they did lamps!
I have a similar lamp that also makes you press and hold. Annoying. Yours even has that knob (mine is all touch) -- it should just have a physical detent at the end that cuts power, you know, like lots of dimmable lamps used to have.
> I have a lamp I really really like
A lamp you love, you might say?
What a wonderful post - I really enjoy seeing other peoples taste laid out in such an accessible manner.
I love the reference to Druk/Another Round in the section on the Louis Poulsen PH 5. Such a great film.
Thank you! And yes Druk was a really great movie.
I enjoyed the article, but I got a real kick out of how the author formats the date into the URL
Yay or nay? I can change it :)
I like it. Though I was rather hoping that /2026/10 would go to an index of posts from this month.
It's good practice I think for avoiding duplicates.
It's very fun, keep it!
For people who don't want to splurge on the Noguchi lamps, Aliexpress has a decent number of knockoffs.
Probably way less stable than the real deal.
We have a couple of the marset lamps that we enjoy as well. The sort of low-poly design is really fun.
The ones that clamp to your desk are no good. The clamp always works its way loose. I drilled a hole in the desk and ran a bolt through it, that works.
My articulating desk lamp was balanced for incandescent bulbs. The LED ones are heavier and pull it down.
The Tizio ones, despite certainly desirable due to Sapper, are crap. Suffer from contact issues and the earlier halogen ones love to overheat. I used to refurbish them for people.
Love the pics. Moved into a place in the 90's. Insurance agent told me, easiest way to liven up a cheap apt was to get good lighting. He was right, but I was too lazy to shop much. Only found one lamp that I really like.
It's an Ikea Torchère: kinda old now, just halogen, but I've always kept a spare "bulb" for it somewhere - replaced it every 10-20 years. I still like the weird pattern on the ceiling. :P
Really loved the lamps featured here. I'm jealous of the whole setup, including the Vitsoe shelving. Saving this for inspiration when I need to revamp my home setup. Thanks for sharing!
Nice lamps, but what's with the photos very significantly stretched out of aspect ratio?
Hm how?
The picture just below the title "Tizio Micro" looking down on the lamp with the lawn behind, part of the collage of five photos, has been squished horizontally or stretched vertically quite a lot. Many of the other photos on the page have also been stretched in one direction but not the other.
Oh those, are vertically shot ones! They are not thinned. Their composition are like that. When you press/click on them you should be able to see them in full page. They look nice on the phone, but on your desktop/ipad (depending on the orientation) it might look bad yeah.
Does anyone know what piano keyboard that is at the "HAY Apex Floor Lamp" ?
Looks like a Kiyola (https://www.roland.com/global/promos/kiyola_series/) I've been eyeing one for ages
Well spotted, thx!
Yeap it's a Kiyola. Both my kids and I love to play Piano.
What a wonderful space you have created. I have so much mindlessness in where I have things placed. I feel inspired to be a bit more purposeful and organize some things now.
What a beautiful home. I love the office and desk setup specifically. The lamps are cool too.
He has a writeup about the office and desk setup too: https://arslan.io/2025/11/18/my-two-part-desk-setup/
Discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48214311
I'd love to have enough space to have a desk facing the room rather than the wall :(
Me too! I briefly worked in a home office with the similar layout to the link above. Made such a massive difference in mood while working.
I noticed a Toyooka Craft box in the article (on the "Louis Poulsen PH 3/2" pic), and thought "fountain pen user." This article about their setup mentions fountain pens.
Man it must be so great to have loads of money
beautiful home and photos! makes me realize some people are just way cleaner than me :D
I share the author's love for nice lamps. A lamp is an object to enjoy every day, which doesn't require any time investment from us. It is just there, with one simple function: to look pleasing.
This is great. Lighting I think is the best thing to spend money on as it isn't exposed to wear and tear like furniture.
In addition to these also a huge fan of Anglepoise desk lamps, Lotte lamps and Mantis sconces.
Are we talking second hand value or re-sell potential?
I couldn’t differentiate one of these designer lamps from an ikea lamp. They look almost the same.
Yes, Ikea copies iconic designer lamps often very closely. I thinks its great, but also love to have some select pieces as functional art.
It's good to have hobbies
The arrogance of people still inventing new lamps after the Ikea KRUX lamp is astounding
Looks like a dog
The consensus in my household is that it's a cow
lol. https://www.ikea.com/au/en/p/krux-led-work-lamp-white-503254...
Had to look it up. The cable coming out of the middle section is unfortunate. I get it's supposed to be vaguely anthropomorphic so that's like a tail or something but... come on.
LMFAO it's cute!
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=Ikea+KRUX&ia=images&iax=images
This PH5 lamp was invented in the 1950s
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poul_Henningsen
I'm not sure why anyone even tried to invent a new pendant light after the PH5. ;)
It is a great design.
I found it when looking for a lamp that doesn't expose the bulb itself, which is exactly what it was designed for.
How does it fare with modern LED bulbs? I imagine the placement of the reflectors assumes an almost-point source of light like a filament would provide, but most LED bulbs now have a plane of LEDs inside a frosted shell.
I guess would it make a noticeable difference to put an LED faux filament bulb in here? Or is it just not as fussy as I'm imagining?
I use a frosted LED bulb and don't see any reason it would work better with an incandescent bulb, i.e. it works great.
Am I the only one who fantasized about the whole place more than the lamps?
Indeed. Having such nice lamps and or items is especially nice when you put them in a nice interior with everything perfectly finished. Put them in a messy place and or a less than perfect place and you lose a lot of the wow effect. Great place and great lamps here, congratulations to OP !
I fantasized about the possibilities of decorating a place, when said decorations do not need to be proofed against wanton destruction by young children
Have two kids, 7 and 10 years old. It’s ok if they grow with it!
Yeah, heheh, plus I think you're just getting to the fun part.
I'm in the middle of moving things around my home and dealing with cords, so the lamp cords are what I focused on.
It's a beautiful space though. He did a great job of cord management on his desk.
For me, it's a little too 50 shades of brown. I love the warm tones and clean lines, but it's all warm tones and clean lines.
No because you likely do not drench yourself in hubris daily.
Thanks for the $$ I'm about to spend :heart: :sob:
I knew, before I had scrolled more than a page down, that you would have an Eames chair. I was not disappointed. Very nice lamp collection!
Better update that bio! It's SpaseXSI now.
Give .webp or .avif some live my friend!
beautiful pieces <3 i inherited a big Poulson and I love it
I love love love my vintage table lamps, they're "Peill Puztler" ice cube lamps I think. They were typically sold back in the days with mirror head bulbs: I know because I was there, as a kid, and my mom (RIP) had those in her apartment. And now I've got them at my place.
And because I hate to have only LED lighting, I stick good old (but brand new) incandescent bulbs in my "ice cube" lamps: such bulbs go by many names and can still be found (they're either for ovens [where they can sustain insane heat], for warming terrariums, for heating lava lamps, etc.).
Just having one or two incandescent bulb in the living room, in addition to LEDs, works wonder to give a cozy ambiance.
I'd say it's a bit sad to have lamps from the 70s but then stick cold LED bulbs into them (and, yes, even "warm" LEDs do feel incredibly cold): put incandescent bulbs and experience them at they were meant to be (once again: no need to replace the entire house with incandescent bulbs, just two or three here and there shall work wonder).
If your warm LEDs feel too cold, they’re not warm LEDs. Most ‘warm’ LEDs are either 3000K or 2700K, which is about the colour temperature of a standard incandescent at full brightness.
Look for 2200K LEDs – they’re actually warm and closer to a dimmed incandescent. I personally prefer 1800K, which are warmer still, but they’re much harder to find and have far fewer options in terms of brightness.
I have a $2.94 USB silicone lamp shaped like a duck. To each their own.
Picture myself a room of complete darkness, the lonely duck.
My 5-year-old sleeps with a silicon dog lamp.
I deeply regret not buying another suitcase to import a Tolomeo from Germany to the USA a year ago.
Unrelated aside, but:
> Fun fact: “Akari” means light in Japanese, both as illumination and as lightness.
Wow! I love it when two languages have matching homonyms. I always wonder "what does it mean ?". Like, in English "second" to mean the unit of time and the place after "first" feels like two distinct usages. But it's the same in Spanish ("segundo"), which points to a deeper connection (and isn't so unsurprising given the shared roots of the languages): the unit of time is called that because it's the second subdivision of an hour.
The two usages of "light" in English are so distinct I'm quite surprised it's like this in the entirely unrelated Japanese language. Is this just a big coincidence, or does anyone know any deeper reasons here?
Unfortunately that "fun fact" is completely wrong (as other people have already pointed out, but with less conviction).
I don't know if this has been mentioned already, but I like arigato in japanese being similar to the portuguese similar sounding word, obrigado.
For the benefit of other readers, this is (to my deep chagrin) just a coincidence. Some other fun false friends (i.e. w/ no actual etymological connection), some sillier than others:
- そう sō, "so"
- 名前 namae, "name"
- 乱暴 rambō, "violence"
- 被る kaburu, "cover"
- 孫 son, "descendant"
- 銭 sen, "one hundredth of a yen" (sounds similar to "cent")
- 買 (meaning "buy") can be read as bai
- はず hazu, "has to"
- 鈴 rin, "bell" (sounds similar to "ring")
- おい oi, "oi"
- 陰気 inki, "gloomy" (sounds similar to "inky")
And just for fun, one from Old Japanese:
- 女 womina, "woman"
Is it though? I though akarui and karui were quite distinct, but I guess they kinda sound similar?
I'm just a beginner armed with jisho dot org, but it does seem like they're entirely different words?
https://jisho.org/word/%E6%98%8E%E3%82%8B%E3%81%84 / https://jisho.org/word/%E6%98%8E%E3%81%8B%E3%82%8A (adjective vs noun but clearly just the same word in different form)
vs
https://jisho.org/word/%E8%BB%BD%E3%81%84 (light weight)
Okay, if three of us agree, it is definitely wrong.
It may be more like two nearby meanings getting translated into the same English word than an independent Japanese version of the exact same homonym
The first example is not really a coincidence: a second is defined by being the second subvision of an hour.
So that example fails to support any reason for akari matching light in English. But for the sake of argument here is another one: じゃり (giari, read as "ja-ri") in Japanese means gravel and in my dialect almost the same sound (giarin, "ja-ri-n") also mean gravel. Go figure.
That was exactly my intended point (and my comment does mention the hour subdivision). There are a lot of meaningless coincidental homonyms, but these tend to not be homonyms in other languages. E.g. I dunno "left" in English would be "izquierda" or "dejó". Or conversely, "vino" in Spanish would be "wine" or "came". The fact that "second" and "segundo" have homonyms in their respective languages is a clue that the unit of time and the ordinal word are the same is not a coincidence. And when you look into it it's for the reason that you state. The homonym pairs indicates an etymological relationship between the two concepts.
So I was wondering if the same applied here. My initial reaction is that "light" meaning "illuminated" and "light" meaning "not heavy" is that this is just one of those coincidences, since I can't see how that one word relates the two concepts. But given that Japanese also does the same, it makes me wonder if maybe there is some sort of relationship. Maybe it was a common belief historically that the sun was not very heavy or something like that. Or maybe not and it's just a rare double coincidence!
At least some of these cases occur because the two concepts are related by metaphor, and cultures behind each language independently followed the same path of metaphorical expansion.
I'm not sure that it's true, sadly—my dictionary, at least, only gives the illumination-related definition for akari.
Wait until you look up the many ways 分 (usually bun in compounds, but used to spell the verb wakaru) is used. (There are also more complex variants of the kanji that emphasize various nuances.)
The wakaru meaning is pretty good too, like understanding something means to break it down?