Light
North-facing rooms are not a problem to be corrected
Trying to make a cool room feel warm with paint usually fails. Working with the light produces better rooms.
Sven Aaltonen
Renovation writer, Rooms With Stories
Sven writes about renovation sequencing, budgets and the trades who actually do the work.
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15 articles
Materials
Stone worktops are four different materials sold as one idea
Granite, marble, quartz and sintered surfaces behave so differently that liking the look tells you almost nothing.
Materials
Metals in a house tarnish, corrode or stay put, and it is worth knowing which
Brass, copper, steel, chrome and iron all change over time, in different directions and at different speeds.
Light
Curtains and blinds are light control before they are decoration
Almost every complaint about a window treatment is a complaint about what it does to daylight, privacy or heat.
Light
Task light has to come from the right angle or it does nothing
Reading, chopping and working each need light from a different direction, and the fitting matters less than where it is.
Light
The shade changes the room more than the lamp does
Two identical bulbs in two shades produce completely different rooms, because the shade decides where the light goes.
Materials
Glass does four jobs in a house and only one of them is seeing out
A window is a structural hole filled with a material asked to carry light, heat, sound and safety at once. Most glazing…
Materials
Leather is one of the few surfaces improved by being sat on
Almost every material in a house looks worse with use. Leather is the exception, provided the finish on it is the kind that can age…
Light
The central ceiling light is a habit, not a decision
One fitting in the middle of the ceiling is what the wiring offered, and rooms have been lit that way ever since. It is a poor…
Light
Dimming is a circuit problem before it is a bulb problem
Dimming used to be a matter of restricting current to a filament. With modern lamps it is an interaction between a driver and a…
Materials
Plywood, MDF and chipboard fail in three different ways
Sheet materials look interchangeable in a merchant yard and are not. Each is made differently, and each has one situation where it…
Materials
Oil, wax and lacquer are three different bargains with a wooden surface
A finish decides how wood looks, how it feels, what marks it and whether a scratch can ever be fixed. Those four things pull in…
Light
A mirror is a light fitting that runs on the window
Mirrors do not create light, but placed correctly they extend the reach of daylight and double the apparent depth of a room. Placed…
Light
LEDs rarely blow, they fade, and that changes how you buy them
A filament lamp announced its own death. A modern lamp dims and shifts colour over years, so a room grows dull without anyone…
Light
Lighting the things you want people to look at
Most homes light rooms and then wonder why nothing in them stands out. Lighting an object is a different discipline with its own…