The lobby of Stressdesign may look modern and chic, but look closer and you’ll see that the Syracuse, New York-based Design firm is actually employing some pretty ancient technology – incandescent lighting!

Stressdesign president Marc Stress wanted to improve the lighting in his office, so he snapped a photo and submitted it to our monthly photo contest. Today, we’re pleased to announce that he is the June winner and will receive five Cree LED lights to replace the halogens heating up his workspace.

Here’s his winning picture and what he wrote about the lighting:

“We have a mix of incandescent and CFL lamps in our office. The CFLs are inconsistent at best, and all the incandescent lamps (add) to heat and $$$ on utility.”

This was the winning photo for the month of June.

I e-mailed Marc to tell him the good news. He opted to receive the Cree LRP-38 ™ light which will replace the 75W Halogens that hang from tracks over the office.

Some facts about the Cree LRP-38 lights that Marc is receiving:

• The LRP-38 consumes only 11 Watts, while producing light comparable to a 75W incandescent.
• It’s designed to last 50,000 hours. That means Stressdesign could leave the lights on for eight hours a day, seven days a week for just over 17 years.
• But these lights won’t burn out instantly at the end of their life, like the incandescents Marc is currently burning.  Cree’s LED lights are designed to provide at least 70 percent of their initial light output at the 50,000 hour mark. Many different factors (such as fixture design and operating conditions like temperature and current) determine the actual lifetime of an LED fixture or bulb.
• The light quality is beautiful. The LRP-38 light delivers warm light (2700K) and gorgeous color (achieving 90 out of 100 on the color rendering index).

Marc said he can’t wait to bring LED lighting to his Design firm.

“I’ve been using LED lighting solutions in various applications in my home and office for the past 5-7 years. I’ve used them for guide lighting, ambient lighting and supplemental area lighting. Early attempts were novel in their power savings, but light output and quality was lacking,” Marc wrote to me.

“Lately, I’ve noticed a huge jump in lumen output, CRI quality and lamping options. I am expecting the new Cree lamps to exceed expectations and provide a better alternative to CFL lamps,” he added.

If you want to give Cree LED lighting a try in your home or office, enter our July photo contest. To qualify for our giveaway, all you have to do is submit a photo of bad lighting to our site. We could be featuring you next month on our blog.