You may associate Philips with little more than washing machines and radios, but the company has come a long way since its days as a humble electrical supplier. Now, it wants to change your life -- with a new range of products designed to promote the ideas of 'sense and simplicity'.
Not sure quite what to make of all this, I found out more at its extravagant Simplicity event yesterday. Philips' version of the future looked initially like Second Life, but let's not forget it is one of the greenest electrical companies out there, and is pioneering all sorts of interesting feel-good lighting products using LED and fluorescent technology, both of which are very energy-efficient. It is breathing new life into the much-maligned fluorescent strip light, creating dynamic lighting that's as soft or as bright as you like.
As a lifelong sufferer of the winter blues, I was delighted to be able to stand in a huge space full of daylight-quality light for a few hours, and it's brilliant to know that you don't need masses of energy to have it. Philips is keen to get dynamic lighting into hospitals, hotel rooms, offices and all kinds of other spaces. Feeling better for a brief exposure, I've since been testing out one of its Energy Lights at my desk, and the fact that I'm still banging out stories at the end of a long day is a good sign that it's working!
Lighting is tremendously important to mood and genral well-being, so it's great to see it being put to use in such a creative and eco-conscious way. I'm not sure I can see the NHS adopting the hospital room mood lighting systems entirely, but it's a nice thought, and certainly one that hospitals, dental surgeries and other places of FEAR (I'm a wuss) would do well to adopt to some extent.
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