27 September 2026 · Notes
Battery or rechargeable: which light for a stone?
Both fit. They are good at different things, and the honest answer depends on how many nights a week the light is on.
The coin-cell tealight
A small light on a button cell, sold in packs of 12 or 24 at hardware stores, dollar stores and online. One comes with every burnt log, its cell fitted, so it works the night it arrives.
- For: under a dollar each, ready the moment you pull the tab, the brightest a light will ever be on its first night, no charger, no tray, no cable.
- Against: the cell dies and you fit a fresh light or a fresh cell. Lit every evening, that comes round often enough to notice. And a button cell is the one part of the whole object to keep from a small child.
The rechargeable set
Six or twelve lights on a charging tray, usually with a remote and a timer. They drop into the same seat as the coin-cell ones.
- For: you never buy a cell again. A timer that switches the light on at dusk and off six hours later is the whole nightly job done for you. The tray lives in a drawer.
- Against: a rechargeable is a little dimmer than a fresh coin-cell light, and it costs more up front. It also needs a home for the tray.
Why both work in the stone
A stone lamp is tuned to a light. If it were tuned to the brightest one, a rechargeable would leave it dull; if to the dimmest, a fresh coin cell would be almost too bright. Ours is tuned to the dim end on purpose: a rechargeable still lights the cracks, and a fresh coin-cell light on night one is the best the piece will ever look. Either way you see stone, never the bulb.
An honest word about run time
Makers quote anything from a day to a hundred hours from one cell, and most of those numbers are not measured. A cell holds a fixed amount of energy and a steady light spends it at a steady rate, so the truth is a number, not a range. We are measuring ours with a stopwatch and will state it on the card in the box when we have it. Until then, think of the light the way you think of a candle: a consumable, and a cheaper one.
Which to choose
- Lit now and then — a dinner, a guest, a festival: the coin-cell light in the box, and a pack of spares.
- Lit every night — a bedside, a hallway, a sill: a rechargeable set with a timer, and the box's light becomes the spare.
- A gift: the box as it comes. It works the first night; the person decides the rest.
Questions
Will a rechargeable tealight fit?
Yes. The seat takes any tealight-format light up to 45 mm across, which is all of them.
Does the remote work through the stone?
We have not tested every remote and will not guess. The ones we have tried work when the sensor faces the open top. If yours does not, write and tell us which set it is.
Is there a timer tealight without a tray?
Yes, on a coin cell: switched on once, it runs six hours and rests eighteen, every day, until the cell is done. We are testing them now; if they hold up, it is the light we will ship.