All products featured on WIRED are independently selected by our editors. However, we may receive compensation from retailers and/or from purchases of products through these links.
This article was taken from the February 2015 issue of WIRED magazine. Be the first to read WIRED's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by subscribing online.
Designer Jake Dyson devotes his time to making lights he claims last (almost) a lifetime. Whether that means building technology adapted from satellites to improve the efficacy of LEDs or developing Wi-Fi controls that allow effortless monitoring and control of those lights, he's switched on to it. "I'm designing lights that you don't have to touch for 40 years," says the 42-year-old son of engineer and inventor James Dyson. "There's a serious need for that in big architectural projects."
His previous innovations, such as the heat-pipe technology in his Ariel and CSYS lights, were inspired by improvements he saw needed to be made to current technologies. The Ariel system uses convection, rather than a fan, to pull air through the system and draw heat from the LED. This cools the chip to such an extent that it has three times the efficiency of a standard LED, and uses five per cent less energy. He is also interested in indoor lighting that matches daylight levels. "The use of lights to achieve this has always created a synthetic and false environment," he says. "Now that we can colour-tune LEDs, this may become possible." How does Dyson differentiate his engineering and aesthetic from his father's? "There are synergies between my father and me. When my father was my age, mobile phones were the size of a briefcase," he says. "The pace of product development is much faster now."
Although Dyson can foresee applying his refinements to other products, he is committed to lighting now. "Today's LEDs are only rated to last seven years and that's not good enough. You don't want to rip out 25,000 light fittings in an airport every seven years, do you?" he says. And speaking of airports, he also dreams of personal flying machines that can pilot themselves: "Now that drones are being considered by Amazon, and Google has a driverless car, it could be possible."
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
