eat by. If properly considered,
there is no reason why one's lighting fixtures should not be beautiful
as well as utilitarian. However, it is seldom indeed that one finds
lights that serve the purposes of utility and beauty.

I have rarely, I might say never, gone into a builder's house (and
indeed I might say the same of many architects' houses) but that the
first things to require changing to make the house amenable to modern
American needs were the openings for lighting fixtures. Usually, side
openings are placed much too near the trim of a door or window, so that
no self-respecting bracket can be placed in the space without
encroaching on the molding. Another favorite mistake is to place the two
wall openings in a long wall or large panel so close together that no
large picture or mirror or piece of furniture can be placed against that
wall. There is also the tendency to place the openings too high, which
always spoils a good room.

I strongly advise the woman who is having a house built or re-arranged
to lay out her electric light plan as early in the game as possible,
with due consideration to the uses of each room. If there is a high
chest of drawers for a certain wall, the size of it is just as important
in planning the lighting fixtures for that wall as is the width of the
fireplace important in the placing of the lights on the chimney-breast.
I advise putting a liberal number of base openings in a room, for it
costs little when the room is in embryo. Later on, when you find you can
change your favorite table and chair to a better position to meet the
inspiration of the completed room and that your reading-lamp can be
moved, too, because the outlet is there ready for it, will come the
compensating moments when you congratulate yourself on forethought.

There are now, fortunately, few communities in America that have not
electric power-plants. Indeed, I know of many obscure little towns of a
thousand inhabitants that have had the luxury of electric lights for
years, and have as yet no gas or water-works! Miraculously, also, the
smaller the town the cheaper is the cost of electricity. This is not a
cut-and-dried statement, but an observation from personal experience.
The little town's electricity is usually a byproduct of some
manufacturing plant, and current is often sold at so much per light per
month, instead of being measured by meter. It is pleasant to think that
many homes have bridged the smelly gap bet