Six Years a Dominatrix

When I moved into my first playspace four years ago, the work of making the space was practical and small — arranging furniture, visualising how the session would flow, amongst which, figuring out lighting. I bought a brass floor lamp from IKEA, paired it with a smart bulb, and stuck it in the corner. Back then, my focus was on utility: how I could best utilise the space for work. The lamp was just something that worked — affordable, functional. It served its purpose over the years.

Fast forward a few years, to a new space we would later name Red Rum. This time, experience had made me more deliberate. I wanted a room with a character and a soul, and we decided on a Modern Victorian style; rich in golds and reds, ornate details, Victorian-styled furniture balanced against clean, contemporary pieces. And again, I had to buy a lamp.

You’d think a lamp would be a small, simple thing. I found myself asking hard questions, questions I never once asked myself — does this lamp fit the decor? Does it sit well on the side table? Does the lamp balance the other light sources in the room? I realised that the lamp was no longer just about light. It was about atmosphere, coherence, intention — the way things fit together to make a space feel like mine.

Recently, I came across the Lamp Theory, which has been credited to the British journalist Louise Perry on the internet, where she likens finding a good partner to finding a good lamp. When you first furnish an apartment in your youth, you just want something that works. As you grow older, you start curating your life with greater care. The same way you seek a lamp that fits the rest of your home, not just one that just works, and this task of buying a lamp gets harder as we grow.

It made sense to me. The older we get, the more discerning we become — not just about lovers, but about everyone we allow into our lives. Friends, colleagues, submissives, partners — the ones we call home. In our youth, companionship was easy: the college roommate who went out with you for Friday night beer, the friend who always game to hang out. But with time, our standards sharpen, our spaces grow more defined. That friend who was my ride-or-die a 10 years ago? I haven’t texted her in months. My friends from college with whom we took a grad trip together? I probably wouldn’t even invite them to my Christmas potluck. Our requirements shift, and our standards grow. Perhaps the pre-party drinks or late-night soccer watch parties make a good weekend together, but not to share a life together; of common dreams, aspirations and goals. Perhaps there’s a slight cruelty to this progress, but standards aren’t just vanity; they’re a way of deciding which light we’d live under.

Just like the arduous task of picking a new lamp in our adulthood, how do we pick the right one? A good lamp does more than brighten a room; it shows what the room already is. The right people do the same for a life.

And if not, we live by the lights we think we accept.

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