Designing lights is no different than any other artistic process; a combination of inspiration followed by hard work.  Being creative is hard, if not impossible to force. Some ideas pop into my head when I wake up while others come from nature or simply driving around and looking at existing homes and wondering what kind of light would look good on that style of house.  But the second part is always the same, making prototypes to see if my ideas will work. Only about 30% of the concepts ever make it to production, but that is still quite few when we are talking about several ideas a month. Most companies make one or two new lighting designs a year, and we add new models every month.  Being small helps, I do all the design, production and finishing work plus coming up with new ideas is very motivating and exciting.  In many ways, these new models are like adding to the family and give a fresh feeling to the lines. Artists are renowned for being fussy and never wanting to make the same piece twice.  That is hardly a sustainable business model when it comes to lighting, but as long as I can keep creating new designs, that keeps my need to be creative in check. It helps that we make so many diverse styles of lights from Southwestern to Nautical and most everything in between. There is never a lack of ideas and new things to try. I could have an employee dedicated to making just samples and concept lights.  So many ideas, so little time...........................