Tags: Furniture, Home Appliances
By KC Santos
QUEZON CITY, METRO MANILA – Valentine’s Day or not, these twisted lamps make for an interesting gift you can give to the object of your affection.
Modular, weather-proof and just plain gorgeous, these lamps are nice to look at. Which is why these caught my attention when I saw them hung around Cubao X.
I later learned that the lamps where sold by May Advincula, the owner and practically one-man army behind her enterprise Light’emUp!.
A mother of four, May is the exact epitome of a working mom who has managed to stay home while still making an income for her family.
May recalls how she has always been entrepreneurial in spirit and how this mindset eventually led her to start her own business.
“At a young age I was already exposed to being an entrepreneur in my own way. After college, I always have this idea inside myself that I only wanted to be my own boss,” she says.
Essentially, Light’emUp! is a hobby turned into business. “It’s a little craft, that as time went by, more friends are asking me to make for them, so I told myself, this lamps must make me something,” she shares.
Indeed, her roses and hearts edition for Valentine’s are just two of the dozens of designs that May has crafted on her own since she started in November.
The technique, she says, was derived from the lamps designed by a Danish designer named Holger Strøm who popularized the spherical lamps in Europe during the 1970s.
Using a tough kind of plastic called polycarbonate, May essentially twists, bends, and interlocks several sheets of the material to form a lamp. As her skills grew with time and a lot of customer feedback, May eventually started to make the designs more personalized to follow a certain theme.
Today, She has developed 22 different designs available in six different sizes. Polycarbonate also makes her lamps ideal for outdoor use.
Even with a steady clientele, May says the business isn’t exactly a success story. Not yet. “Starting a business from a scratch is never easy. Especially if materials are not readily available and that I am literally a one-man army.”
“However, all these tiring things turn into triumph when customers stare at my lamps, fall in love with them and take them home,” says May, who believes that lamps have the ability to change the mood and ambiance in an instant.
Depending on the design and the size, Light’emUp! Lamps can usually go from P500 to P1,500. For May, these are the kinds of things that makes you look at the other side of spending.
“I consider my lamps priceless since you get an instant stress reliever. Sometimes, it’s really not just about a thousand peso- we can spend just to feel good,” she says.
As May sets her best foot, or in this case, hand forward, she hopes to inspire other parents to develop the same level of interest in earning from home while still having the time for your family and your craft.
“Small crafts can give you good fortune even when this is done at home. We can even earn while we keep kids at home, earn while you are sending them to sleep. I want to share this thought to moms out there, that there is money at home.”
(Photos courtesy of May Advincula)
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