The Philips Hue family of connected lighting continues to add to features — recently introducing a new variety of connected LED bulbs designed to offer shades of white light to support daily routines. The the Philips Hue White Ambiance bulbs come can adjust between cool daylight (6500k) and warm white (2200k), using “light recipes” to promote more energized feelings during the day and a relaxed environment in the evening through via the newly updated Philips Hue smart-device application.

The entire Philips Hue family builds on the the substantial number of applications, products and platforms that work with the system, including with Amazon’s Echo (aka Alexa), Apple HomeKit, Bosch, Nest, Samsung SmartThings, and uses those relationships to create a powerful lighting experience wherever the system is installed. An added bonus to the Philips Hue White Ambiance starter kit is the dimmer switch included in the kit — a device that can “give any location the most popular part of smart lighting: location-wide dimmable scenes that are accessible from anywhere.” (Philips Hue Makes Household Lighting Dimmable, “The Architechnologist”, August 25, 2015)

The Philips Hue White Ambiance starter kit includes two Philips Hue white ambiance bulbs (800 lumens at 4000k) that use a standard fixture base, making them compatible with existing light fixtures, a version 2 Hue bridge (that supports Apple HomeKit) and the aforementioned wireless dimming switch. A single Philips Hue White Ambiance bulb costs $29.95 (compared to the $59.95 for the full-spectrum bulb) and the complete starter kit is available for $129.95.

 

The new Philips Hue application has a “Routines” feature that lends itself to creating repeatable scenes and the lighting scenarios that are appropriate for them. For example, the White Ambiance lamps and a “wake up” routine could imitate the rising sun and gradually wake a user up with increasing brightness; alternatively, a “go to sleep” routine would dim the lights slowly.

Using the new application, all Philips Hue dimmer switches connected to the bridge can recall scenes with a press of a single button and repeated presses will cycle through up to five different light recipes. Our favorite recipe is “nightlight”, designed for those with young children who have to get up in the middle of the night (or partners who stay up until all hours of the night reading in bed), it delivers a low level of light while minimizing exposure to blue light, lessening the disturbance to your sleep cycle.

Taking advantage of the range of light from the Philips Hue White Ambiance lamps allows users to impact the design of the places they are installed. The connected lights can  you can subtly differentiate spaces — dividing them with one setting and merging them with another. The emotion of spaces can also be influenced, a warm golden white light can be inviting to visitors while a crisp white can focus on a task at hand. Thanks to the availability of connected lighting and the intelligence of the system behind it, nearly any place can shift and evolve with changing illumination.