It’s a whole new time zone…

Once upon a time… hey wait a minute, this story is much more fun than that. So, I’ll start over.

Daylight Wasting Time Industries is going live when Daylight Savings Time is ending, November 1^st, 2008! I know, I know, the symbolism is too obscure to be a good marketing ploy however for me it represents an auspicious beginning.

After all, DWT Industries is really just the spin of my own imagination. Although, I owe the brothers Edelman, for familiarizing me with the term (daylight wasting time) in our childhood.  It came from a time when one could drift from interest to interest, tripping along the chaotic path of following one’s curiosity without specific purpose or a time line, that often led to the discovery of one’s true love. By living the artist’s life, I extended that period of  intellectual exploration and  I found my true calling – to create as much fun, cool stuff as I can. johnny i here, and I'm an illustrator/designer who has been creating surface design  and patterns for manufacturers of various products and textiles for years and this is my first foray into making and selling my own product line. If you’d like to see my illustration site go to http://www.johnnyi.com and check it out, there’s a bunch of different projects that I have done there.

Northern Night Lights is the first product of many that will be rolling out at DWT. For a while, Handmade in the USA meant that I had made it personally! Now, thanks to a little help from my friends, the crew responsible for the handcrafting is growing all the time.

I am especially interested in making as many of our products right here in the States as possible. Its harder than I realized. Right now the Northern Night Lights are made with wood products grown and made in the US, assembled here in the country and only a few parts have not been sourced from American manufacturers. We tried to get lamp cord sets domestically but when the shipment arrived the product had been made in China! Even the brads are made in China. So if any of you know American manufacturers these products we are interested in talking to you. Contact: sources@daylightwastingtime.com

The wood  used is sustainably harvested Poplar from managed forests in the US (so far from Michigan and Tennessee) and then the frames are made here in California. The mulberry paper is made from the bark of the Sa Tree in Thailand which is fast growing and is a ecologically harvestable forest crop. (I’ll post more on forest management methods later.) The mulberry paper is trimmed in my studio and then hand run through the same printers I use for my archival art prints that I sell on my web site. (However because it is printed on mulberry paper instead of my acid free art papers it is not archival but pretty lightfast nonetheless.) After printing, its trimmed to size and then hand wrapped onto the frames, the lamp cord set installed and then wrapped in tissue and boxed for transport. The use of adhesives, wood finishing products and any other potentially harmful chemicals have been kept to an absolute minimum and environmentally friendlier substitutes used. Even though the lights are pretty resistant to fading they are not guaranteed from fading over time, particularly if you keep them in a location that is in direct sunlight. Try to choose a spot out of the sun if possible for the longest life of your Northern Night Light.

Stay tuned for more products that will coming out soon and if you’d like to get a notice  by email when we announce something new just email me at ji@daylightwastingtime.com and I will make sure you get on our mailing list.

Finally, a shout out to the Muses, Sales Angels, Wise Woodsmen and Biz Wizards (they know who they are) without whom this would not be possible. Thanks!

Peace out,

johnny i
Idea Retreival
Daylight Wasting Time Industries... The Art of Leisure