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2 days ago | Advertorial | Ruth Ann Dykstra

“After 40 years of drawing other people’s homes, I’m putting my pen down.” – Why a 74-year-old architect in Michigan is selling his last light paintings at a special price

Lowell Haverkamp, 74, draws little rooms by hand and puts a light behind them, so the sun comes in when you switch them on. Now he is stopping for good.

Holland, Michigan, October. The little studio above Lowell’s garage smells of ink, sawdust and coffee. The walls are pinned with sketches: living rooms, reading corners, a beach house with tall windows. On the long drafting table lie fine pens, a steel ruler, a soldering iron and a box of tiny warm-white lights. Half-finished frames lean against the wall, some still empty, some already holding a drawing. Lowell bends over one of his last pictures, the way he has done every morning since he retired. But this autumn is different. It is his last.

“I’m seventy-four,” he says quietly, and holds up his right hand. It trembles, just slightly. “For an architect, that’s the end of the line. I can’t draw a straight line anymore.” He sets the pen down. “And it isn’t only my hand. Nobody draws by hand now. Everything comes out of a machine somewhere. The way I work is slowly disappearing.”

40 years, 1,100 houses – a life spent drawing where the sun falls

Lowell has done the sums. In forty years as an architect in West Michigan he drew close to 1,100 houses. And in every one of them, before he drew a single wall, he drew one thing first: where the four o’clock sun would fall across the living room floor. “Clients didn’t remember the floor plans,” he says. “They remembered that drawing. People don’t fall in love with a house. They fall in love with the light in it.”

When he retired in 2017, he kept drawing rooms, just for himself. Then one January evening he put a small light behind one of the drawings to see what would happen. “The sun came in,” he says. “In the middle of a dark Michigan winter, in a little drawing, the sun came in.” Since then he has made more than 2,000 of them, sold at the lakeshore markets and to people whose houses he once designed.

What makes Lowell’s light paintings so special

It isn’t only the drawing itself. It is the way each one is built: like a tiny room you can switch on.

In daylight it looks like a fine black ink sketch in a simple light wood frame. Switch it on, and the light comes from behind the drawing, exactly where Lowell has put it: through the tall windows, across the floorboards, over the arm of a chair. The rest of the room stays a cool blue-grey, just like a real room on a sunny afternoon. There are three kinds of light, a cool morning, a bright afternoon and a warm golden sunset, and nine brightness levels, all on a little switch on the cable. It plugs into any USB charger, power strip or laptop, and it stands on a shelf or hangs on the wall. Each picture is 9.1 by 6.7 inches, about the size of a hardcover book.

The result is more than a lamp. It turns a dark corner into a sunny room, at any time of day and in any season.

“Some of my clients have had their little room on the windowsill for eight years”

Lowell pulls an old cigar box out of a drawer in the drafting table. Inside are hundreds of letters and cards. “Thank-you notes,” he says. “Some of these people have written to me every Christmas.” He takes out a card dated 2019. It reads: “Dear Mr. Haverkamp, my husband is in a care home now and his room faces the parking lot. I put your little beach room on his windowsill. Every afternoon at four the nurses switch it on, and he tells them the sun is out.”

There is a simple reason for this: care instead of speed. A factory turns out thousands of light-up frames a day. Lowell makes one at a time, from the first pencil line to the ink, the frame, the light and the final check. A single picture takes him about six hours, a full working day at his age.

The end of an era – and one last chance

Just before Christmas, Lowell will close his studio for good. “There’s no one to take over. Nobody wants to spend ten years learning to draw light by hand.” Around 412 light paintings are still stacked on his shelves, in three rooms: the beach room he drew after a winter on Sanibel Island, the reading corner of his own studio with the maple tree outside, and a family living room with a dog asleep in the sun. His life’s work. The last collection that will ever pass through his hands.

To make sure they go to good homes before the studio closes, he has made an unusual decision: one clear special price on every picture, $39.99 instead of $79.99. “It’s not about the money anymore. I want them on nightstands and bookshelves where somebody switches them on every evening,” Lowell says. “My grandchildren Maddie (24) and Cole (27) are selling them online for me. At my age I have no idea how the internet works,” he adds with a laugh.

Cole also came up with the name. “That first winter he came up the stairs, saw the little rooms glowing on the shelf and said: Grandpa, you’re painting with light. So they became light paintings.” The name stuck. And for many customers, a simple picture has become an evening ritual: switch it on, sit down, and watch the sun come into a little room while it is dark outside.

What sets Lowell’s light paintings apart:

• Made in Lowell’s studio: Every picture is drawn, framed, wired and checked by Lowell himself, one at a time, with no assembly line.
• Sunlight you can switch on: The light falls exactly where an architect would put it: through the windows, across the floor, over the furniture.
• Built to last: A sturdy natural wood frame, a solid cable with its own switch and long-life LEDs, made for years of evenings.
• Three moods instead of one harsh glow: Cool morning, bright afternoon or warm sunset, dimmable in nine steps. Ideal as an evening light, night light or background light.
• Simple to use: Plug the USB cable into any charger, power strip or laptop, press the switch, done. It stands on its own or hangs on the wall.
• Limited: Only around 412 light paintings are left from Lowell’s final collection. When they’re gone, there will be no more.

What real customers say about Lowell’s light paintings

“The perfect present for the people you really love”

His customer Karen M. (52) from Traverse City agrees: “I gave my mom the beach room for her nightstand two weeks ago. She spent forty winters in Florida with my dad, and she can’t travel anymore. She had tears in her eyes, not because of the picture itself, but because she could feel straight away how much care had gone into it. Now she switches it on every evening and says: there’s my beach.”

Where can you buy Lowell’s light paintings?

Lowell’s light paintings are only available through Backroad Goods, an online shop for real handwork from selected makers. His grandchildren Maddie and Cole run Lowell’s own little corner of the shop there. Only there will you get the original light paintings from his studio. Similar-looking light-up frames from mass production have started to appear on Amazon and other big sites. At first glance they may look alike, but they have nothing to do with Lowell’s work.

Only this winter – then it’s over

Lowell plans to close his studio for good just before Christmas. “By then I’d like every picture to have found a good home. After that, it really is the end,” he says quietly, and gives a small smile. “Forty years of houses. It’s been a good life.”

If you would like one of the original light paintings from Lowell’s final collection, don’t wait too long. Maddie and Cole will keep shipping after the studio closes for as long as pictures are left on the shelves, until December 31 at the latest. But with the special price and this much demand, the remaining 412 are not expected to last.

It is the last chance to bring a piece of real handwork into your home, before Lowell’s little sunny rooms are gone for good.

The verdict

Lowell’s light painting is the little picture people fall in love with. It is made by hand in his studio and feels like a small window of sunshine for your home, with warm light that makes a nightstand, a bookshelf or a reading chair instantly cozier.

A feel-good piece with real heart: carefully drawn, well made, thought through. And every evening a small moment of magic when the sun comes into a little drawn room. Thank you, Lowell!

The internet loves Lowell’s light paintings