09/24/2026
For a few hundred years, homes treated light as a material — stained glass in ordinary entry doors, transoms passing light between rooms, lanterns that threw pattern across the ceiling. The modern home swapped all of it for clear panes and recessed cans, which is efficient and completely uniform, and it's part of why a space can feel the same at nine in the morning as it does at nine at night. Bringing it back is easier than it sounds, for a home or a rental: a vintage stained glass panel hung in front of an existing window on two hooks, colored glassware on a sunny sill, stained glass film if you can't touch the windows. Guests notice light like this even when they can't name it. Full video: youtube.com/