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Our first infographic is online! It shows in a clear and simple way how light works and which steps you should follow for a healthier and happier life. Good light is essential for our wellbeing, but we spend most of the time indoors deprived of natural daylight. But our bodies need light! Good light makes you happier, sleep better and feel energized. It makes sure your biological clock is in sync with the 24-hour day. So: Start measuring with a lux meter app on your phone (the light should be at least 1000 lux during daytime). Make sure you have Good Light while working. Locate your desk within one meter or increase the electric light level to 1000 lux entering your eyes. Live by the 20-20-2 rule. After every 20 minutes of screen time, look at the sky for 20 seconds. Spend 2 hours outside every day, preferably in the morning. Get the Good Light Guide! View infographic here

Nowadays we live in a 24/7 society. A lot of people often work night shifts. The question is: is it really necessary to work in the night, should those people have a night job? How big of a deal is it if you’ll get your package 12 hour later? Photo by Verne Ho on Unsplash If you work the night shift it means that you’re active while your biological clock signals you should sleep. Our system isn’t made for having to work at night, even eating at night or seeing light isn’t natural for our body. The Dutch health council concluded in 2017 that this affects your health in such way that it leads to an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and sleep disorders. The sleep-wake cycle is regulated by the biological clock in your brain. It differs between people: in some people it runs behind and in others it runs faster, resulting in night owls and early birds. In those extreme chronotypes, their life is often out of sync with their biological clock, but it’s easy to fix! The solution: More light during the day, at least 2 hours of daylight, and especially for the late types way less light during the evening. A regular sleep-wake cycle will make you feel more energized, boosts your immune system and leads to healthy ageing. Source: November magazine Clique media (Page 28) An article by our board member Marijke Gordijn

Nathalie Cijntje, a woman who lives in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, has a hard time living in her apartment, why? She is deprived of daylight because of a huge building wrap advertising hanging outside of her building, blocking both view and daylight. Nathalie hasn’t seen daylight inside of her apartment for one and a half months now. During the day it’s dark, but the advertising is lit up in the evening so it becomes very light in the apartment when it should be dark. She sometimes sleeps somewhere else to escape her overly lit apartment. To compensate her for the discomfort her landlord gave her a one-time 500 euro discount on her rent. But it doesn’t compensate the inhumane living conditions. Due to the lack of light Nathalie feels depressed, her work suffers under the circumstances, she is moody and lacks focus. Our expert Marijke Gordijn regarding the topic: It’s unhealthy to be deprived of natural daylight all day. We need at least 1000 Lux during the day for a considerable amount of time (an estimate of light intensity can be obtained by a light measuring app on your phone). The short-term effects include feeling moody, sleepy and less creative, if it continues the effects will be greater. Long-term daylight deprivation includes a higher risk of cardiovascular diseases, brain diseases such as dementia and sleep disorders. Sleep is essential for your health and wellbeing, if you don’t have a good night rest you often don’t feel fit. Read the article on RTL news

The second deLIGHTed talks webinar ‘wintertime edition’ was a great success! deLIGHTed talks is a free webinar with lighting experts who talk about different aspects of light and our health. We organize the deLIGHTed talks in cooperation with the Daylight Academy, Society of Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms, International Association of Lighting Designers, Luger Research. Two light professionals were invited to talk about the winter blues, daylight saving time and the effect it has on our well-being. You can now watch the lectures online here: ​ Prof. Till Roenneberg – Why shifting to daylight saving time is a bad idea The circadian clock plays a crucial role in switching to constant standard time or continue with DST, it potentially impacts our health and performance. In this talk, Till will give the necessary background to understand how the circadian clock, the social clock, the sun clock, time zones, and DST interact. Dr. Manuel Spitschan - Dim days and long nights: Optimising light exposure during the dark period of the year Manuel will talk about the impact of light on our physiology and behaviour. He will talk about how our eyes and brain process light and what the appropriate light exposure is. Panel discussion Attendees asked questions about these topics which were answered by different experts. Want to read about our recommendations? Get our Good Light Guide, which contains a lot of information about good light. We look forward to the next delighted talks webinar!

In April we developed the Good Light Guide with several lighting experts to spread knowledge and practical advice when it comes to our bodies need for Good Light. You can now read all about it in the new issue of the LED professional Review. Photo by DocuSign on Unsplash We hope that you enjoy this first edition of the Good Light Guide, and it inspires you to join the movement #goodlightgroup and share the knowledge in this guide with family, friends, neighbours and colleagues. You can sign up for our newsletter at goodlightgroup.com. If you are interested in participating or joining our movement, please write us an email to: info@goodlightgroup.org. Read the magazine

We all complain during the darker period of the year about tiredness, feeling moody or depressed. Especially after two months of cold weather and nothing to look forward to, except for some more months of darkness and cold weather. It’s a phenomenon which is easy to explain: a lack of light! In the summer the days are longer, the light is brighter and nights are shorter but, in the winter, we usually spend our time inside a warm home or office which are usually insufficiently lit. Photo by Noémi Macavei-Katócz on Unsplash A short explanation: In autumn we have to deal with a changing day length, we get short stretches of daylight and early sunsets. You spend less time outside and this means a lack of Good Light (daylight). This disrupts your biological clock. Lucky for us, it’s easy to avoid a winter depression, go outside and enjoy daylight! Light has a huge effect on our health and mental wellbeing. Good Light is as important as Good Food, Good Air and Exercise. Good Light makes you feel energetic, alert, concentrated and it synchronized your biological clock, is responsible for your day-night rhythm and it improves your sleep. So, you will feel less moody and more energized. Why the light inside isn’t good enough is because daylight is ten to hundred times brighter than most lightbulbs and at sunset daylight softens and is dominated by orange and red (which naturally relaxes us). So, go outside! Source: wijzijnwyz.nl/blog/mentale-gezondheid/een-winterdip-fabel-of-feit/

Published in spring in English, the comic book Enlighten your clock: How your body tells time is now available in 21 languages! It explains how light not only affects plants or animals but also our bodies. How we need light to produce sleeping hormones or wake up and feel energized. It was celebrated with an online event, hosted by the Daylight Academy. During this event Daniel Smith shared his views about sleep, light and mental health in teenagers. You can watch it now online. You can download the comic book in these languages: আলোকিত হোক দেহঘড়ি (Bangla) Descobrindo seu relogio biológico (Brazilian Portuguese) Il·lumina el teu rellotge (Catalan) 了解你的生物钟 (Chinese) Kast lys på dit indre ur (Danish) Verlicht je klok (Dutch) De la lumière sur votre horloge biologique (French) Un reloxo con moitas luces (Galician) Unsere innere Uhr (German) Διαφώτισε το ρολόι σου (Greek) अपनी सर्केडियन घड़ी को प्रबुद्ध /सचेत करें (Hindi) おしゃべりなネコに学ぶ (Japanese) Apšviesk savo laikrodį (Lithuanian) Opplys klokken din (Norwegian) ساعت بدن خودت رو کوک کن! (Persian) Ilumina o teu relógio (Portuguese) Просвети свои часы (Russian) Hágase la luz... en tu reloj interno (Spanish) Kroppens egen klocka (Swedish)

In this webinar, organized on October 14th by Reliable Lighting, our board members Jan and Marijke will tell you everything you need to know about how light affects everything from Mood to productivity and sleep. So, if you're an Interior Designer, Electrician, Architect or anyone else who makes decisions about people and places, this webinar is for you. Things that are covered: What is Good Light, and why do we need it? How does light affect our physical and mental health? What can we do to bring good light into our spaces? Watch the webinar here

Join the Good Light - Good Life 2nd edition webinar and listen to the explanation of the negative effects of daylight savings time and how to cope with the dark period of the year. After the lectures you can join the panel discussion to discuss all aspects of clocks and time and the trending topic 'daylight saving time'. Together with the Society for Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms (SLTBR), the Daylight Academy (DLA), the International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD), and Luger Research (LR), we are organizing and presenting the “Good Light – Good Life” lectures. Visit our event page for more information

Anne, a freelance marketing consultant, participated in the ‘30 days Good Light experience’ with a simple solution to create Good Light at her workspace. This solution consists of two flexible desk luminaires each with a smart bulb with high lumen output (more than 1500 lumen) that can be varied in intensity and light colour. You can control the smart bulbs with an App on your phone or tablet. The App has a circadian rhythm option (day/night rhythm), so the light mimics daylight and changes every hour. If you are interested in more details of this simple good light solution, send us an email at info@goodlightgroup.org Anne installed the lights at her home office. She always thought her home office had plenty of light, she has a window behind and next to her, but the lux meter (a measuring app for light) showed it was way less than the daily light requirement. After the 30 days experience she really doesn’t want to work without this good light solution anymore. “Now I notice the amount of light I was getting before the experience was not enough and this new set-up is much more comfortable for my eyes. I don’t squeeze my eyes since I’ve installed the lamps, which is less tiring. Maybe it even delays wrinkles, since I don’t squeeze my eyes all the time. I’ve noticed that I’m very tired at 22.00/23.00hr so I go to bed earlier than before but wake up at 7.30 without alarm and with way more energy. It might even have improved my mood, maybe it’s because of my improved energy level. Before I used those lamps, I was a bit cranky and negative and now I feel like myself again.” She will continue to use this set-up, so she can enjoy the ’30 days’ Good Light experience for as long as she wants, so not a 30 days experience for her but a lifetime Good Light experience. A short list of her experienced advantages: - Improved energy, less tired during the day. - Improved focus at work. - Less squeezing with her eyes. - More regular sleep pattern - It might even have improved her mood. Do you want to participate too? Please contact us for further information

The amazing Katia is a lighting designer who puts her heart and soul into her job. She is the founder of ‘the lighting police’ and curator of ‘woman in lighting’. She started the Good Light experience on July 13th, so she is on to her second week now. “Goes very smoothly so far. Eye adaptability is much better since day 1” according to Katia. She received the light ‘Alven’ from BrainLit. It has a personal connected, dynamic and free-standing LED luminaire-powered BioCentric Lighting™ system. It instantly alters the emotional character of its environment and delivers a more natural light to its user. Alven helps synchronize with daylight and supports beneficial health outcomes. Visit and follow her Instagram for an update of her experience. Katia Kolovea

The journalist Jeroen Kreule was the first person who participated in our 30 days good light experience. We provided him with a lamp from our Participant Sparckel designed for use on a desk, so perfect for a home office. He wrote an article about his experience in last Saturdays newspaper AD with a very wide reach. Jeroen Kreule freelance journalist. © Jean-Pierre Jans We started the challenge to bring the positive effects of good light under attention. Since most people are not aware of the fact they need good light, we want to let people experience it. Jeroen Kreule was our first participant and just finished his 30 days of good light. He was very positive about how good light exposure affected him. He sleeps better, he is happier and has a better mood. In his article he tells his personal story and he interviewed Jan Denneman for more background information. More information about the 30 days experience Read the full article