Page 127 - enLIGHTenment Magazine - January 2017

Retail Spotlight

Visitors from all over the world come to

Tim Jackson of Urban Lighting in San Diego

for his carefully chosen selection of

contemporary lamps and xtures.

BY LINDA LONGO

A

s a high school student, Tim Jackson Starck plus architecturally inspired rms such as

spent much of his free time help- Artemide, Memphis, and AI (Atelier International).
ing out at Cabrio Lighting, a lighting In 1990, Ron Rezek opened his Highlights

store in California where his mother lighting showroom in San Diego (there were four

worked. “I did deliveries and assem-
other Highlights galleries: Santa Monica, San Fran-
bled house packs; I was schlep boy,” he jokes. cisco, Sea le, and Miami) and it was Jackson who

Jackson was so dedicated and pro cient that he served as the VP/Sales & Showroom Operations
was appointed assistant manager at the shop be- for 13 years, honing his expertise in high-end Con-

fore he had graduated high school.
temporary lighting design under Rezek’s tutelage.

A few years later Jackson worked at Inside – a When the opportunity arose in 2004 to buy
San Diego lighting showroom opened by decora- Highlights in San Diego (Rezek had sold his group

tive arts and ne contemporary design expert of galleries in 2002), Jackson and his husband/
Michael Dunsford – where he learned about an- business partner jumped at the chance. They kept

tique furniture as well as high-end contemporary Rezek’s tenet of o ering the best in Contempo-

lighting from artists such as Dale Chihuly and rary lighting design and eventually changed the
industrial designers such as Ron Rezek, Philippe
store name to Urban Lighting in 2006.

An array of distinctively di erent Contemporary-style products a ract passersby on two of the busiest pedestrian-heavy

streets in San Diego’s historic Gaslamp Quarter.

january 2017 | enLIGHTenment Magazine 125