Throughout the city, Ken McKelvie has worked his magic brightening up whole houses, inside and out.
By Christy Marshall
Photograph by Mark Gilliland
Considered by many to be St. Louis' best lighting designer, Ken McKelvie spent years educating himself in a series of disciplines before launching his career. After traveling through Europe, he graduated from college with a degree in art education and a minor in English. Then he studied photojournalism (graduating with a master's from Boston University) and spent 16 years working as a photojournalist at the Christian Science Monitor. While in Boston, he met his first wife, a professor in the theater department at BU. When he tagged along to rehearsals, it was the lighting design that captured his attention. His wife became ill and then pregnant. The McKelvies bought a cottage in Carmel, Calif. Their daughter was born; 10 months later, McKelvie's wife died. He moved to St. Louis to enroll his daughter in Prinicipia, the same school his wife had attended. His first job here was with Directions in Design; then he went off on his own with McKelvie Lighting Design.
How did you first get into lighting design? To take care of my daughter and to handle my frustration as a photographer, I gutted and remodeled my cottage for three years. I started studying daylight and electric light and how they work. Did you get any training? I went to the junior college in Monterey and took related classes in interiors, color, lighting, design and architectural drafting. The University of Oregon School of Architecture had a $1 million grant for the study of light in architectural space and I said, 'That's for me.' I studied there for four years and got a second master's degree.
Are there common mistakes people make with lighting? They use cheap surface fixtures, where you can see the light bulb—they are distracting. I use deep cells; the light is deep, off the surface. You just see the effect. And that's what I'm after: effects.
What's the cause for that mistake? Most of what they buy is contractor-grade. It's cheap, so they buy it. They aren't educated as to the subtlety and value of good lighting. They don't know the options.
What about lighting specific rooms, say, the dining room? One mistake people make is hanging a chandelier over a dining room table and then putting it on a dimmer. They can't see to eat, so they take the dimmer all the way up to bright. If there is a lot of crystal, it's glaring. It hurts the eyes. A chandelier was originally designed to be lit by candlelight, and that is how it should be lit when you're dining. It needs to be dimmed down.
How do you solve the problem? We make tiny holes in the ceiling and put in four low-voltage halogen lights to crisscross the table in light. It's four fixtures that might cost the client $800, and they get a stunning effect.
What about lighting the bathroom? When lighting for grooming, never use any of the gold or warm trims. The light should be similar to the light the person is going to be seen in.
How about lighting an entire room? Another big mistake is to rely just on recessed lighting to light a room. It's good to use sconces, table lamps, pendant fixtures to bring light so it is more at a human level.
What about lighting art? We use a number of filters, and we soften the light to get rid of the scalloping and to let the artwork come forward. I use about six different filters. Also, on artwork, the halogen light is slightly whiter than standard incandescent, so the colors of the artwork are truer.
Are there effective techniques for producing warm lighting? One that is very popular is uplighting, putting illumination on the ceiling and bouncing it down into the room. It gives a nice soft lighting.
What is a tip for buying a lighting fixture? Look at the trim ring. If you use the gold or warm haze, it will add warmth to all the colors in the room. So if your color palettes are woods and primary warm colors, then the light reflects off the trim and adds yellow to the room. But if your color palette includes cool colors, this yellow will kill those colors and deaden them.
What's the must-have new thing on the lighting market? The new finish [for the baffle] is called haze or clear diffuse. It doesn't show any fingerprints. It comes in silver or warm haze, which is gold.
Why would you use one over the other? Clear diffuse doesn't show that flash of silver.
The biggest trend? The latest thing is lighting control. It used to be extremely expensive, but Lutron designed a system that doesn't require everything to be wired together. You can take out the existing dimmer, replace it with a Lutron dimmer and now it's on the system. It's a radio wave. It has controls where you can set scenes.
What is on the market that everyone should use? Using dimmers is so valuable. It costs a teeny bit more, but what you get back is control of the lights for aesthetics, for mood control. You can bring the lights up for cleaning and down for ambience, comfort.
How much do you charge to design the lighting? To do a room, we tell people it is about $600 a room. If it's a kitchen or living room, it could be $900 [without the fixtures].
Who are the other big lighting designers in town? Ina Hughes, she did the [Dennis] Jones house, and Randy Burkett. He's major. He's done casinos all over the world.
