This week I spent considerable time considering whether to purchase two of these nickel wall-mounted lights/scones for candles. I planned to put them in the bathroom; on each side of the mirror; and liked the idea of legitimising candlelight as a source of lighting by giving them 'fixed' hardware.
In the end, I decided that I didn't have the room, but it got me thinking about luxury and practicality. The fixed wall candle fitting, is clearly high-end, but also horrendously inconvenient- I couldn't see myself lighting candles when nipping into the w/c in the middle of the night! But I think it is for that reason, that they are high end. The sheer impracticality of them makes them uncommon and therefore desirable.
Could the same be said for other luxury items like log burning fires, ink-drawing fountain pens and my utterly impractical Japanese phone? Absolutely. High-end items, as mentioned before, can effortlessly improve our quality of life but also sometimes take us a step backwards.
