The sun warms our planet, provides us with light and is crucial to all life on Earth.
One of my readers asked me to talk about windowless rooms. I sent a query back to her explaining that rooms w/o windows can be so depressing. “What tactic do you want me to take? ”
Her answer: Safety from natural and man-made disasters. Not depressing.
Well folks, with my 40 plus years of interior design work, I can tell you that a windowless room can be depressing. So, before I talk about creating one that has live-in possibilities in case of disaster, I want to let you know that without access to natural light and fresh air, bacteria has no way to dissipate.
It’s the ultraviolet light of the sun that grows our veggies that make us healthy, and kills the bacteria that make us sick. Oh sure, you can get special indoor artificial lighting that does some sun imitation, but living in a space where there is no natural light of the sun, is not ideal. Not ideal physiologically or psychologically.
The president of the company always gets the corner office. The one with the windows. It’s not priority by seniority, it’s productivity by possibilities. The ones who make the decisions get the best window(s). Important decisions are made in this conference room.
Conference room with natural light, lots and lots and lots.
The more important it is, the bigger the windows. The industry tried to change this philosophy, but it did not work. The natural light makes the grade.
When’s the last time you gazed upward and marveled at the mysterious, life-giving force that is the sun?
If you believe the whole staring-at-the-sun-makes-you-go-blind thing (which is actually true), you’re probably not doing a whole lot of sun-gazing. But it’s a real marvel: The sun warms our planet every day, provides the light by which we see and is necessary for life on Earth. It can also cause cell death and make us blind. It could fit 1.3 million Earths inside its sphere [source: SpaceDaily]. It produces poem-worthy sunsets and as much energy as 1 trillion megaton bombs every second [source: Boston Globe].
All of this, and our sun is just a plain old average star, by universal standards. It’s really just proximity that makes it so special to Earth. We wouldn’t be here if the sun weren’t so close.
And what about cruise ships? My son Paul frequently goes on cruises with his friends and family. He gets an exterior stateroom with a balcony, but there are interior staterooms as well. But those staterooms have no balcony and are windowless.
Ship interior stateroom windowless
They use the old mirror trick to give the impression of light. The mirrors are in the oval/round shape of the ship windows. Not too shabby.
I prefer windows, even on a ship. A windowless room, bah, humbug. Even if you got stuck in a basement apartment when you got out of college, just a slit of a window inspired a happy dance. But if you have one of those theatre rooms,
Windowless Theatre Room
most likely in a lower level with no windows or you cover the window or eliminate the window. Now we are talking about an on-purpose windowless room. This room is not to live in unless…unless there has been a disaster and you must stay in this room until the disaster ends. The room pictured here is pretty fun to spend some time. Light colors and reflective surfaces, and if you turn out the lights and put on the movie projector, turn up the sound, munchies at hand, not too bad. Add battery powered lighting, shelving, canned/dried food/water and potty, some warm clothes, you got a great place to wait out a disaster.
A safe place, a secret room below ground, a tomb in a pyramid.
King Tuts Tomb
New for 2020. Tomb construction with all the amenities for windowless winning spaces. Protect the people, protect the environment.
King Tut's tomb map to make your own passage
Will this go over big in the future? Will we need to construct windowless rooms with secret passages to protect our sanity, our children, our lives?
Sun photo above courtesy of NASA
I’m with PJ on the claustrophia!! I do not like small or windowless spaces. I have to have windows. I already decided after the October storm, that if there were an apocalypse, I’d never make it. I think the reason we chose the house we live in today is all the light that comes in the giand sliding glass door throughout the day.
Casey, i am with both you and Paula. My studio has 12 feet of window 4′ high, of the most gorgeous north light. North light is perfect for an art studio. It is cool and constant. Then there are fenestration on the east as well, but it doesn’t interfere with my painting. I paint in there, but I write in another space, more sunny. Lots and lots and lots of light. Our new wood stove also supplies light, the flickering kind. Thanks for commenting.
Cool post, Gail. I am a bit claustrophopic–okay, a LOT claustrophobic–and hate windowless or slosed in spaces. As we renovate our master bedroom suite and my husband has plans for an office for me, we’ve designed it so that there will be a transom above my desk that overlooks my garden. If I had to stare at a wall, it would completely kill my creative energy. If a disaster of sorts drove us into living under ground, I’d take my chances with the disaster!
Paula, the reader that asked me to do this post was disappointed I did not address nuclear disaster. I did not want to take that tact. But, you said it, rather than look at a wall, you would take a chance on the disaster. I am not sure I would go that direction, but windowless spaces are not appealing, but neither are they healthy. You, as a writer, I am sure, have thought about the vastness of the ocean, the sky, the mountains. We go to the seashore, or climb the highest mountain, or enjoy the colors of a sunset, all for the health of our body and mind. No matter how you fix a space to emulate natural light, nothing can replace the real deal. Sometimes we do not have choices, but awareness is a good beginning.
Just looking at the stateroom makes me start to panic. I could never stay in a windowless room. I would never be able to relax.
And I love that conference room. I could totally write a book in there.
The interior stateroom on a ship is really lovely, but, like you, I need daylight. If you like cruises though the interior spaces are less money than the ones that see daylight. I would not take the cruise. I don’t care for cruises anyway with or w/o a window. I feel trapped, especially in the ones that serve 5000 guests, Yuk. Are you sure about being able to write in that conference room? I would be busy enjoying the view. Thanks Katy for the comment.
When I was a kid, we frequently went to a restaurant that had no windows, but it took me a while to understand that. There were these sunken big circles in the ceiling with really bright lights hidden by the lip of the circle edges (as in we couldn’t see the bulbs) I thought these big circles were skylights. The light was bright and there was some kind of glass so it was difficult to see the actual ceiling. Since we sometimes went there at night, you’d think I’d have figured it out earlier.
Anyway, I always thought if I had a bunch of money, I’d put in lights like that. It really opened up the smallish dark room–artificially.
Hi Kate Rothwell, isn’t amazing what kids notice. So, did you ever put in lights like that? Or better still, did you ever get a bunch of money? Yup! That is a good solution for windowless spaces. You see them in kitchens where we always need more/better lighting. My kitchen is in the center of the house with rooms surrounding it. The open kitchen has no windows of its own, but lots of them in the surrounding rooms. Thanks for the comment.