Creating the Best Garden Solar Lanterns: How a Father and Daughter Pioneered Solar Garden Lighting

Before solar lighting became a familiar sight in gardens, patios, and outdoor living spaces, Allsop Home & Garden was imagining a different way to bring light outdoors.

The idea wasn't simply to make a solar light. It was to create solar garden art—combining beautiful artisan glass with the power of the sun to allow glass art to shine brightly in the garden at night, without electrical cords or plugs.

The idea, first conceptualized by Jim Allsop and his daughter Jamey, would ultimately give birth to an entirely new concept of garden art: a product that could transform gardens by day and by night, all while harnessing energy from the sun.

Where Solar Garden Art Began

That original idea became The Firefly, an innovative solar-powered garden stake featuring artisan glass and designed to bring decorative, solar-powered light into the garden. The Firefly helped establish Allsop's pioneering approach to decorative solar lighting. But for Jim and Jamey, the idea was bigger than a single product. They wanted to explore what else solar power could make possible and continue creating beautiful solar garden art.

Their search for new ideas took them to China, where they traveled to meet with designers and manufacturers. While strolling through the lantern-lit markets of Shanghai at night, they found the inspiration that would spark their next major innovation. Seeing the way traditional Chinese lanterns transformed the nighttime environment helped shape the idea for their next product: a solar-powered collapsible hanging lantern.

From Solar Garden Art to the Solar Lantern

The early idea was simple but distinctive: Why couldn't a lantern be something you could hang anywhere, lighting itself without the mess and hassle of unsightly electrical cords? Why confine the location of a light to the nearest electrical outlet when you could transform a garden, a landscape, a party, or even a night market with beautiful light exactly where you wanted it?

Portability, beauty, and light on demand—that was the exciting concept. Turning that concept into a product, however, presented a new challenge. The lantern needed to be beautiful and portable, but it also needed to withstand the elements and remain outdoors year-round.

At the time, the options for materials that could meet those design criteria were limited, and initially, Nylon proved to be the best material for the job. The result was a new approach to garden lighting: a lightweight, collapsible, and portable lantern powered by the sun that could be left outdoors year-round.

During the day, these lanterns could add color, texture, and personality to a garden. At night, they came alive with a warm glow, creating an entirely different experience.

 

The Search for a Better Material

For Jamey, functionality was only part of the equation. She handled the creative vision for the fabric solar lanterns and wanted to move beyond the look of Nylon, searching for a material that could be both durable enough for year-round outdoor use and beautiful enough to become a work of art.

Inspired by tin luminarias, fajalitas, and the punched-metal patterns of Moroccan lanterns, she spent years exploring materials, colors, patterns, shapes, and forms. That search eventually led to Tyvek®, a lightweight, durable, and versatile material that could be laser cut, shaped, printed, and layered to create the elegant punched patterns that became a signature of Allsop's fabric solar lanterns.

Allsop obtained the rights from DuPont to use Tyvek® in solar lanterns, allowing the company to combine its patented solar-powered lantern concept with a highly engineered material suited to year-round outdoor use. For Jamey, it also provided a new creative canvas for developing distinctive patterns, shapes, and designs.

The resulting lanterns had an almost delicate appearance, yet their Tyvek® construction made them extremely durable and well suited to life outdoors. What looked delicate was designed to endure, allowing the lanterns to remain outside year after year while bringing color, pattern, and warm light to the garden.

Jamey's creative direction ultimately led to the Soji Stella Tyvek® solar lantern lines, combining solar technology, artistic design, and durable outdoor construction in a way that would become an important part of the Allsop Home & Garden story.

The combination of solar technology and Tyvek® also gave Allsop a new creative canvas. The lanterns could move gently with the breeze, produce one-of-a-kind light patterns with an inviting glow, and introduce color, metallic finishes, and intricate patterns into outdoor spaces. Over time, Tyvek® solar lanterns became a hallmark of the Allsop Home & Garden product line and an important part of the company's identity.

Legacy in Light

The idea behind Allsop's lighting has always been about more than illumination. It is about creating products that complement the spaces where people live and gather, using color, pattern, materials, and light to create a sense of warmth and atmosphere. Solar power opened the door to a new way of thinking about outdoor lighting, and that spirit of creativity continues to shape Allsop's designs today.

What began with solar garden art has grown into a diverse collection of solar, rechargeable, and plug-in lighting. From the garden to the home, Allsop creates a variety of designs to bring beautiful, inviting light to every space.

Explore Allsop's Solar Lantern Collection