Set sprinklers to water the lawn or garden only - not the street or sidewalk.
Use the microwave to cook small meals. (It uses less power than an oven.)
Purchase "Green Power" for your home's electricity. (Contact your power supplier to see where and if it is available.)
Scrape, rather than rinse, dishes before loading into the dishwasher; wash only full loads.
Cut back on air conditioning and heating use if you can.
Turn off appliances and lights when you leave the room.
"The next five years of lighting will have more change than the last 50 years," according to Lights Fantastic owner Jon Sayah.
Chalk it up to a government energy bill passed last December that has incandescent bulbs on the black-out list and a bevy of more eco-friendly alternatives ready to turn us on.
That's why the longtime Greenville Avenue lighting boutique has unveiled DS2 – as in design studio, second floor. Buyer and manager Jim Rutledge dubs it a "demonstration lab" for innovative and eco-friendly contemporary lighting. We declare it a candy-colored wonderland. Sleek, curiously-shaped lighting fixtures cast a rainbow of hues over rooms adorned with Alessi accessories, Kartell furniture and sculptural modern art (these pieces are for sale, too).
What's lighting's hottest trend? LED, baby. As every new Dallas restaurant seems to have discovered, the versatile light-emitting diode is cool-burning, green-friendly (lasting up to 50,000 hours) and available in more colors than a box of Skittles. We even found LED "tape" that can be trimmed to fit. Compact fluorescents and halogens round out the offerings.
As for fixtures, Rutledge says we've been "bronzed to death" and that aged brass with its "rich, deep patina" is coming next; he also sees us swapping out our satin nickel for shiny chrome.
More changing with the times, the showroom unveils a new 1,500-square-foot traditional-lighting room this fall to display unique fixtures for non-modernists along with plenty of overscaled chandeliers. The reason for plus-sizing per Sayah: "We need something for all of these grand Highland Park foyers."
DS2 at Lights Fantastic, 4645 Greenville Ave., 214-369-1101
