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In younger years I carried a Zippo everywhere, and considered it a perfect object--until I got a job at a restaurant, where I had to light dozens of votive candles at the start of each shift. The ability to light downwards would've saved a lot of time, spilled wax and burnt fingers.
Enter the Dissim lighter, which has been designed for both upright and inverted use.
The product page also features this cutesy, unnarrated design story that looks like a Hollywood montage sequence of how a scriptwriter imagines product designers work:
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At $48, the Dissim ain't cheap--you could buy two or more Zippos for that much)--but it does something the Zippo can't. With gift-giving season coming up, I'll put this in the category of Thing I Wouldn't Buy for Myself But Would Buy Someone Else as a Nice Gift.
I’m a lapsed industrial designer. I was born in NYC and figured I’d die there, but a few years ago I abandoned New York to live on a farm in the countryside with my wife. We have six dogs.
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Rethinking Commonplace Objects: Dissim is a Lighter You Can Invert
The big hole for putting your finger in... it makes the lighter bigger than necessary. Using a butane lighter to light candles isn't hard. If the candle is in a jar and hard to reach, a long match or very thin candle (I forgot what they are called) is good solution. Long-nosed butane lighters are easily available for just a few dollars, and can aid in lighting candles above one's head (are are often used for lighting gas hobs).
At the same time, there are torch-style lighters for this task which are a lot cheaper. Any smoke shop in any big city will have torch style lighters. I don't know how much the typical smoker would be willing to pay for a lighter like this.
Clever, but we always tilt the candle instead of the lighter. That works perfect for us.
You can revive your old Zippo with a butane torch insert that'll to the trick... at a much friendlier price point.
Thanks for the tip!
Ps. I'd almost (re-)start to smoke :-)