Illuminating Tile Mosaic by Lucedentro
25 February 2010
“Increase and Multiply”
In writing these blogs, I have been blessed, from time to time, with favorable comments from people who are interior designers, an item I bring up today because I sometimes find myself fantasizing about my partner and I getting this site to such a level that it would be the “talk of the town,” especially among designers. And if that sort of thing were to happen, I have to think that it would be blog subjects like today’s that would “push us over the top.” I have recently come across a product from Lucedentro, which is an Italian company that specializes in photoluminescence. So, what is that, exactly?
Photoluminescence, to quote from Lucedentro’s website, “is essentially the property of certain rare earth aluminates which retain solar or electric forms of light, store it and give it off, in six different colors, for a period of time that varies from eight to ten hours.” To me, truthfully, that is the sort of statement that should have been set in caps, or better yet, plugged into some kind of neon lights, but I guess there’s a coolness about one that tends 
to go with those who make discoveries like these. What this product really needs, I think, is a bit of passion, which brings me back to why I decided to write a blog on Lucedentro.
The item at the top of this blog is a bathtub that glows in the dark, but really, there are so many other uses for a product like this. I spent a happy half hour on their website poking around and came up with a couple of other pictures that, to my mind, do a much better job of illustrating the possibilities of this product. And even then, I do not think they have done all they can do with this product. These glow-in-the-dark pebbles that we show here are items that could surely be incorporated in a walkway or a border. Better yet, you could incorporate those pebbles into tile and set those tiles round an indoor tub/spa for the master bathroom. Instead of occasional candles in votive candles in glass cups that overheat, one would have the cool sensuality of a glowing light that illuminates but never overpowers. That and my better half and a bit of the bubbly would do it for me!
I have posted some pictures from their site here, but, really, I think these people are just scratching the surface. The idea of something that glows in the dark-especially for those of us with backyard paradises of one stripe or another-has all kinds of design possibilities. Some years back I saw a documentary on a fashion designer who took a trip to Paris, visited the restroom and told his buddies that he’d kill for a couple of yards of fabric in the same pattern as the wallpaper in the power room.
Photoluminescence is a concept I find intriguing in and of itself, but those who design for a living read about this sort of thing and immediately find themselves thinking of the many design motifs to which a concept could lend itself. But that’s always the way of it. Once imagination is given rein, it tends to increase its progeny quite nicely.
Joseph
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One Response to “Illuminating Tile Mosaic by Lucedentro”
February 25th, 2010 at 7:42 PM
Very interesting product there Joseph. Now how can I incorporate them into my cabinet designs? Hmmm… Maybe a home theater design could use these gems as accents.
Joe