Why should you be able to walk into a shop and buy a tungsten filament bulb?

This sparked outrage among fans of the traditional filament bulb — and a race among designers to produce equally beautiful compact fluorescent lamps.

The filament bulb, which dates back to the 1880s, will start to disappear from stores within two years as part of measures agreed yesterday to reduce energy consumption.

So, you walk in on the polished concrete floor to sit on reclaimed furniture and marvel at the exposed ducts and plain filament bulbs.

And low-energy bulbs do not last 12 times longer, as stated; they have an estimated life of up to 8,000 hours, as opposed to 1,000 hours for filament bulbs.