david k warfel
Last week I delivered a webinar with the same title as this blog post and it was one of the hardest presentations I have done in quite some time. Change does not always come easy for me, but it is a vital part of the creative process. When I pitched the webinar idea to the... Continue Reading →
*BS = Building Science When Green Building Advisor and Fine Homebuilding friends asked me to join an episode of the BS* + beer show, I was honored and a little scared. Why? Because builders and lighting designers do not always get along. In retrospect, I need not have feared. BS* + Beer is a weekly... Continue Reading →
https://www.technologydesigner.com/2020/12/10/lighting-layout-is-not-design/ I recently wrapped up my year of writing for Technology Designer, an elegant quarterly publication that also featured my stories on baths, living in place, and linear lighting. I was given an open invitation to share my final thoughts for design professionals to finish the series. I returned to one of the most common... Continue Reading →
Seven Saintly Solutions, Presented by David Warfel from DMF Lighting on Vimeo. One of the perks of starting your own company is that you get to pick your job title. At some point I decided that "Chief Evangelist of Light" (CEL) would be my own. Evangelist is a term that can have positive and negative... Continue Reading →
Human Centric Lighting (HCL) is a nebulous term quickly replacing Circadian Lighting as the go-to language for describing lighting strategies intended to improve our lives. The more expansive idea behind HCL is that it includes circadian rhythm science but also accounts for moment-to-moment human wellness, comfort, and needs. Human Centric Lighting sounds awesome, doesn’t it? Recently... Continue Reading →
Imagine the future: light helps you keep your balance as you age, cuts down on point sources that cause glare, minimizes sleep disturbances, and helps you see what you are doing better than ever. Wouldn't it be nice? Pushing these boundaries requires experiments like our recent lighting makeover at my parents' farmhouse in Illinois. The... Continue Reading →
A few years ago I heard a simple phrase from a leading lighting researcher: "Light is a drug." Like most drugs, light causes chemical reactions in our brain and body. Moods change, biorhythms change, migraines disappear. Wait, migraines? Dr. Mohab Ibrahim, director of the chronic pain clinic at a hospital in Tucson, Arizona, has an... Continue Reading →
There are more lighting products than ever on the shelves, but that can make it tough for a homeowner to make smart choices. Why is lighting getting harder? How can we wade through the hype and get better lighting in our homes? The last fifteen years have seen the biggest disruption in lighting since Thomas... Continue Reading →
I live by the rules. But am I wrong? One of those rules is to never mix warm white bulbs (yellowish) with cool white bulbs (bluish). I learned this rule back in the fluorescent day by looking at ceilings where some bulbs were pink and some were blue and the end result is that the... Continue Reading →
I frequently hear myself saying that lighting is not brain surgery, that getting it right just requires the attention of a dedicated experienced professional. I might be wrong. (Not literally. I could never do brain surgery because I would pass out as soon as the knife dug in. I'm getting faint just thinking about it.... Continue Reading →
the language of light 