Himalayan salt lamp is made of pinkish salt crystals with a bulb in it. These crystal salts came from the Himalayan mountains and salt caves. They look beautiful and they can have air cleansing and mood boosting qualities too.
There are times when you want to turn off every bright light in the house and enjoy the ambient light of a lamp. It creates the mood and an atmosphere that’s loved by millions around the world. Himalayan crystal salt lamps have gained a lot of popularity and attention in the recent years for offering cozy light and indulging ambience.
- What Is a Himalayan Salt Lamp?
- How Does Himalayan Salt Lamp Work?
- What Are Negative Ions?
- Himalayan Salt Lamps for Negative Ions
- Hygroscopic Nature of Himalayan Salt Lamps
- Major Benefits of Himalayan Salt Lamps
- How to Pick the Best Salt Lamp
- Signs of Fake Himalayan Salt Lamp
- Before You Buy the Salt Lamp
- Where to Buy the Best Salt Lamps
- Final Words
What Is a Himalayan Salt Lamp?
Himalayan salt lamp is as close to natural ambience as you can get. It is made of Himalayan salt crystals, commonly found in the province of Punjab, Pakistan. Rock salt (another name for Himalayan salt) is found in crystal form and has a pink color due to the presence of certain impurities in it. This is why it is called pink salt too.
Himalayan salt lamp is a big crystal of this salt with a bulb in its center. The hollowed crystal with a bulb inside it glows and produces a warm yet dim light to create the perfect ambience. Due to pinkish red shades, these lamps are also known as Himalayan pink salt lamps.
How Does Himalayan Salt Lamp Work?
The idea of a Himalayan salt lamp is pretty simple. A bulb is placed inside the crystal of Himalayan salt. The crystal can be small or big – you choose the size depending on your budget and the size of the room where you will be placing the lamp.
A small crystal can weigh up to 5 pounds whereas a big crystal for big rooms can weigh up to 50 pounds as well. Since they are real crystals and no efforts are made to make them look polished and sleek, every salt crystal will be different from the other.
Below is a Himalayan rock salt lamp video of Steven Bettles, a YouTuber from Australia, explaining in great details about Himalayan Salt Lamps. In his video he also has a bunch of different sized lamps to give you a vivid idea of how big or small these crystals can be. He also tells you which size will be perfect for which room size.
When you switch on a bulb inside the salt crystal lamp, it heats up the lamp. This results in the production and dissemination of negative ions in the air. These negative ions neutralize the air by joining with positive ions. The presence of negative ions in the air makes a person feel refreshed and rejuvenated.
What Are Negative Ions?
Ion is an atom or molecule, either positively charged or negatively. The positive or negative charge is due to the fact that the number of electrons in that atom or molecule is not equal to the number of protons. The full name of negative ions is anions whereas positively charged ions are known as cations.
How Are They Present in Nature?
Moving or falling water like oceans and waterfalls are the best sources of negative ions. Sunlight, storms and lightening in the clouds also give rise to negative ions. The refreshing atmosphere of beaches and waterfalls is due to the presence of negative ions in abundance.
What Are the Effects of Negative Ions?
According to Pierce J. Howard (PhD), negative ions help boost oxygen flow in the body. He’s the director of research at the Center for Applied Cognitive Sciences in Charlotte, NC. Due to increased oxygen flow in the body and brain, a person feels alert and refreshed when there are negative ions in the air.
He also says that negative ions can help a person keep away from the allergies and other conditions arising from the germs in the air. When a person feels refreshed in open fields, in front of the beach and after opening a car window, he/she is feeling the effects of negative ions.
Himalayan Salt Lamps for Negative Ions
The first thing that you need to keep in mind is that you don’t have to expect Himalayan salt lamps to be the powerhouses of negative ions. When you switch them and the salt crystal gets heated, you go get negative ions that gradually spread in the air.
However, you will not expect them to produce as many negative ions as you can find on beaches or near waterfalls. Think about it, when you are on a beach or standing close to a waterfall, you are breathing in air that can contain 10,000 negative ions in just one cubic centimeter.
When you are inside your house, you have computer displays, TV screens and other electronic devices constantly producing positive ions. The concentration of negative ions in such environments can worsen to up to only 100 negative ions in every cubic centimeter.
So, when there is a Himalayan pink salt lamp in your room giving out its amber glow, it is constantly producing negative ions. This can help you feel boosted and refreshed. These negative ions are constantly reacting with positive ions, neutralizing the air and making it fit for you.
There is no doubt that you can increase the number of negative ions in the air by burning multiple salt lamps in your house. Furthermore, it should help you to know that positive ions created by TV, computers screens etc. make you feel lazy, drowsy and stressed.
Hygroscopic Nature of Himalayan Salt Lamps
Do not let the term “hygroscopic” scare you. All it means is a process in which a substance will absorb the moisture from its surroundings. Hygroscopic nature of salt lamps means just that – they absorb water from air and tend to look wet.
If you live in an area with very little humidity, your salt lamp will still look dry. However, in areas where there is high humidity in the air, the salt lamps can look really wet. However, the bulb inside the crystal heats it up and causes the water to evaporate really quickly.
Mold, bacteria and allergens are often trapped in the air by water vapors. Due to the hygroscopic nature of salt, it attracts those water vapors, cleansing the air of allergens and bacteria. Even when water evaporates again due to heat, these harmful agents keep sticking to the crystal’s surface.
Major Benefits of Himalayan Salt Lamps
Himalayan salt crystal lamps are not just some cool looking colorful lamps on your table. People like to have them in their homes because of many additional benefits. Here are the major Himalayan salt lamp benefits in the house, and also for your health and well-being.
They Can Boost Energy Levels
Robert E. Thayer, a world renowned researcher in the subject of human mood, writes a research on page 40 of his book called The Biopsychology of Mood and Arousal, and says that when people were exposed to high concentration of negative ions, their moods filled with energy and they also saw a great boost in their reaction time. You already know how energized you feel when you open the car window after traveling for a few hours while the AC is on. This same mood boost is felt when you are on a beach or close to a waterfall. The boost in your mood and energy level is caused by the presence of high number of negative ions in the air.
Rock salt lamps release negative ions in the air as you continue to use them over time. They cannot increase the concentration of ions in the air as much as waterfalls can but they definitely give a significant boost to negative ions in the air inside your home. This makes you feel refreshed, boosted and energized with its long-term effects.
Salt Rock Lamps Can Cleanse the in-home Air
Natural Himalayan salt lamps can cleanse the air inside your house with their hygroscopic qualities. Using this process they attract and trap the water vapors present in the air. With these water vapors they are able to trap any harmful particles that are traveling in the air with water vapors too. The water vapors start appearing on salt lamps when they have been on for a long time. If you are living in a very humid place, you will notice that they get really damp.
The best thing is that this cycle continues and you can expect your air quality to get better with time. After trapping water on its surface, the heat of the bulb inside the salt crystal causes water to evaporate again. However, the harmful particles remain trapped in the salt crystal.
They Can Reduce Allergies
It is not proven scientifically that you can completely cure your asthma and other allergies by using pink himalayan salt lamps but the hygroscopic nature of salt is proven science. You can say that it definitely helps in reducing the allergens in the air by trapping water that contains these allergens. If you put a couple of salt lamps in your room, they might help reduce allergens to a level where any harmful allergies can be avoided. However, it is recommended that you light your salt lamp regularly in the room every day to gain the most of it.
Himalayan Salt Products Can Boost Sleep Quality
People around the world are becoming more and more sleep deprived due to the use of computers, smartphones and tablets. These electronic devices are notorious for releasing positive ions in the air. The increased level of negative ions in the air causes a person to feel irritable, down and drowsy. As you sleep with a salt lamp by your side, it will continue to spread negative ions in the air and neutralize any positive ions by reacting with them.
This can help boost your sleep quality. Once you start sleeping well, you will wake up fresh and energized. You have to realize that sleeping is the refreshing phase of your body and you need to feel fresh after sleeping for the whole night. When you feel all stiff after waking up in the morning, it is because you did not have proper sleep at night.
They Can Help with Chromo Therapy
If you have heard this term for the first time, just know that chromo therapy is the use of colors to bring a person’s body into balance. It helps boost people’s energy levels and mood, and can also assist in curing certain diseases. The colors that you get from himalayan rock salt lamps are mostly shades of red and orange. According to Chromo therapists, each section of the body and organs are associated with certain colors. Several analytical papers on chromo therapy as a form of treatment for hormonal balance in humans have been published.
Red and shades of red are considered high-energy colors. Leslie Harrington notes in a study that in most Olympics competitions when the opponents were evenly matched with one team wearing blue and other team wearing red, it was the athletes wearing red that won more. Leslie Harrington has founded LH Color, a firm in Old Greenwich performing researches on color and delivering color consulting services.
As salt lamps become more and more popular around the world, more studies are being conducted on their benefits. It is hoped that soon there will be more information available on their benefits and how they can help people live with boosted moods.
Now that you know the many benefits of rock salt lamps and how they can make a room look beautiful with their dim yet warm light, here is some information to help you buy the right one.
How to Pick the Best Salt Lamp
Here is some information to help you buy the right lamp according to your needs.
Choose the Right Size
As stated above, salt lamps can be of many different sizes. As you go for bigger sizes, the weight of the lamp will also increase. If you are thinking of putting the lamp on a glass surface, make sure your glass is solid enough to hold the weight. From 5 pounds to 50 pounds, salt lights can be light and heavy.
Now, the most important reason why you need to consider the size of the lamp is because different sizes will suit different room settings. If you just want one for your bedroom, a small sized 5-pound salt lamp would be just enough. If you are buying one for commercial use i.e. for a restaurant at some 5-star hotel, you might want to go for the biggest one that weighs around 50 pounds.
Choose the Right Shape
Which shape you choose and like is a pretty subjective matter. However, it won’t be wrong to say that salt lamps look the best in their natural shapes i.e. rough and irregular shapes. But if you want a more polished look, you can pick any shape you want. From cones to tear drops and heart shapes to complete round balls, they are available in all the shapes you can imagine.
If you want to take it a step further, you can go for a hand carved bowl of Himalayan salt filled with irregular shaped crystals. This amazing setup looks spectacularly beautiful because when you light the bulb fitted inside the bowl, the entire bowl glows up as well as the crystals. Keep in mind that even the bowl is made of Himalayan salt.
Choose the Right Clarity
It is best that you inquire about the clarity of the crystal if you are purchasing online, or check thoroughly if you are purchasing from a store near you. The clarity of the crystal depends on how the salt was formed. If it was formed under hot conditions, it will be clearer. Salt formed under cooler conditions can make it hard for light to penetrate through them.
You should pick the one that allows ample light to penetrate because if the crystal is very smoky and unclear, it will ruin the effect of the lamp for you. However, you can choose a high powered bulb to illuminate the crystal if you have ended up buying a non-clear one.
Signs of Fake Himalayan Salt Lamp
There are some signs that will tell you that the salt lamp you have is not the genuine product but a fake. Take a look:
Your Salt Lamp Is Overly Bright
The brightness of the crystal can vary from crystal to crystal but if yours is so bright that it makes the entire room bright, it might be a fake one. You can try to change the light bulb but if even a small bulb is appearing too bright in your lamp, you might have bought a fake one.
Your White Salt Light Was Cheap
Most Himalayan salt crystals are red, orange or pinkish in color. White crystals are pretty rare and so when they make a lamp from them, it is quite expensive. If yours is white but you bought it pretty cheap, it might be a fake one.
Moisture Doesn’t Affect It Much
As hygroscopic as salt is in nature, if you are living in a humid region, your salt lamp might appear damp. You might even have to use a piece of cloth to clean it regularly. If your salt lamp doesn’t bleed like that despite you living in a humid area, your lamp might not be real.
It Appears Solid as Steel
Salt lamps are made naturally from 100% salt crystals. They are pretty fragile in nature. If you drop them, they can easily break into pieces. If you dropped yours and it survived the fall like a champ, there is a chance that you have got a fake one.
Before You Buy the Salt Lamp
Before you buy your own rock salt light, keep a few important things in mind. First, if you are living in a region where there’s a lot of humidity in the air, you will need to clean your lamp regularly. Secondly, it would be best to keep children away from the lamp as it is real salt in its original form. You don’t children to drop it and then start eating pieces of it.
Lastly, salt lamps are known for their amazing mood and health benefits due to the generation of negative ions, it does not mean that you expect a complete life change by having one in your house. To carry the point across, you feel boosted and energized on the beaches due to increased negative ions in the air, but that does not change your life all of a sudden. Keep your hopes and expectations realistic with your salt lamp too.
Where to Buy the Best Salt Lamps
There are several online places where you can find salt lamps of different shapes, sizes and designs. You will first have to decide the shape and size you want for your salt lamp before you pay for one. If you are more interested in a bowl of salt filled with several crystals, you might want to try this hand carved Himalayan salt lamp.
There is another really attractive version of the Himalayan salt lamp, the round basket salt lamp. This basket can hold a lot of salt crystals in it and thus can be used as an air purifier as well. It looks extremely beautiful and you can change the brightness of the light with a dimmer as well.
Lastly, you have the salt lamp in its most recognized and popular shape. This natural salt lamp consists of a big crystal with a glowing bulb inside it. This Himalayan salt lamp remains the bestselling lamp out of all other fancy looking options.
Final Words
People are always looking for unique ways to beautify their homes and create unique experiences. Himalayan salt lamp is definitely one of the most unique items out there that adds beauty to your house, creates a cozy atmosphere in your rooms and has health benefits too.
Most of the salt lamps sold on Amazon and other websites receive a very appreciable rating of above 4 on average. This is a sign that most of the people who purchase them, love them. At such an affordable price you should not think twice before getting these unique glowing Himalayan salt crystals all the way from the other side of the world to your house.