Friday, December 21, 2007

It’s almost the weekend, the holiday weekend at that, and the holidays always bring a flood of new movies. I can’t wait.

Lighting, of course, is vitally important to the mood of a movie. So many movies make use of crystal chandeliers to create an aura of luxury or romance, or for historic ambiance. But Hollywood’s obsession with light goes beyond that.

Movie makers use light to wring the emotions – to inspire fear, anger, passion, sentiment. We know that evil lurks in the heart of the bad guy, because of the way his face is lit. We know who’s falling in love, and who isn’t, according to how the light dances in their eyes, or doesn’t.

I saw a movie last night where sea and sky interacted to produce light of a terrible brooding quality. And I recall another movie where the heroine’s face, hair and body glowed whenever she experienced love.

You too can orchestrate amazing lighting effects, right in your own home, if you have crystal chandeliers. But the mood you’ll create will be entirely good and delightful. Any bad guys will leave their badness at the door as they enter your radiant rooms. Less than perfectly beautiful people will shed years of care in the kind, caressing light glancing off your crystal.

Most lighting is flat and unforgiving. Faceted crystal breaks up the light, bathing everything and everyone in a flattering luminosity.

And so the stage is set for families to feel happy, lovers to revel in each other’s charms, guests to get into a party mood, children to be merry.

I wish everyone a holiday full of good movies. I hope you’ll study the lighting while you’re there. And may 2008 bring you a Schonbek crystal chandelier (or two), among other good things.

Thursday, December 20, 2007

Today I walked to work through a forest of Rivendell crystal chandeliers. At least it felt that way.

I’ve often compared Rivendell to flowers shimmering with the morning dew.  But it’s winter now and very snowy, and I realized quite suddenly that I should change my metaphor with the season.

The look of a row of cherry trees outlined in glittering snow really did remind me of Rivendell. I imagined the trees turned upside down and hanging from the sky.

Ice rather than snow glittering on the trees would be even more suggestive of crystal encrusted chandeliers. But ice storms are a lot of trouble. How wonderful that you can bring the ice indoors and render it harmless, in the form of a crystal chandelier.

Rivendell is a beaded crystal chandelier. The crystal beads are astonishingly prismatic for their small size. The explanation is that the crystal is by Swarovski®, the most brilliant crystal in the world.

Rivendell is pictured in a Schonbek catalog called “Artforms.” This term is really internal and doesn’t appear in advertising.  Perhaps Schonbek uses the term to give themselves permission to be wild. The crystal chandeliers in this catalog break with tradition in magical ways.

Rivendell is a glorious outburst of leafy, floral shapes. Cappela is extraordinary for its mirrored frame and oversized pendeloques with unusual crystal cuts. Scheherazade with its beaded swirling frame is an exotic fantasy of a chandelier. I encourage you to visit a lighting showroom with a large display of Schonbek crystal chandeliers, so you can see these remarkable designs. While you’re there, you might ask about “Artforms.” The sales person will be surprised that you know the inside term.

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

How to light a room with a computer in it? Or a TV? The chic answer is a crystal chandelier. It might even be a deep answer.

All those images on monitors are illusions, though we tend to forget this. They are messages made of light, and they flow through our lives in an ever changing field of surreal experience.

A crystal chandelier shares these qualities to some degree. The light dancing off the crystal is never static, constantly shimmering and shifting. What you see is light in motion, as lively and ephemeral as your stream of consciousness. So at some scientific level, the chandelier is not different from the images flickering on your monitor.

Then again, a crystal chandelier can be mesmerizing, but it doesn’t consume you in quite the same way a computer or a TV does.

“The medium is the message,” said Marshall McLuhan, prophet of the electronic age. He was warning against the unforeseen consequences of technology taking over our lives. A crystal chandelier is a living symbol of the art and history of our civilization over the centuries. It reminds us of the richness of human existence, past and present.

Electronic images and communications can steal your mind. We’ve all experienced this. But a crystal chandelier stimulates your mind. Your enjoyment of it takes place in real time.

Imagine yourself entering your home office. You switch on the light and you’re aware of the crystal chandelier. It slows you down for half a minute and gives you a little glow of aesthetic enjoyment before you turn your brain over to your computer.

Every time you get up to pour a cup of coffee or stretch your legs, the crystal chandelier is there, back in your field of perception, suggestive of a larger universe filled with spectral brilliance.

A crystal chandelier in your home office will inspire you to design the space and not just fill it. You’ll want a lovely desk and furnishings. You’ll even shop for electronics with aesthetics in mind. Anything that encourages us to give beauty a priority in our lives has to be a good thing.