Inventors make things to solve problems. Making water cleaner, cars faster, appliances smarter. Such problems solved, and the inventions that solve them, can be granted a patent. But, sometimes the problem does not seem so, well, problematic.

For instance, can an invention be patented if it merely causes something to be more beautiful?

One lock company seems to think so. In fact, this week an Indiana inventor was granted United States Patent No. 10,794,082 for a door handle using a chambered light source for illuminating a door with a pattern - it makes the door itself more beautiful too.

The inventor felt that door handles include lights merely to give information related to the status of the door, e.g. “opened” or “closed”. These old doorknobs fail at enhancing “the overall aesthetic of the door or the handle.”

So, this Indiana inventor made a doorknob that “includes a shell having a front side and a rear side” and “a light source” which is placed inside an ”internal chamber.” This way a “pattern is positioned on the rear side of the shell” via a semi-clear piece projecting a pretty little pattern onto the door.

Now that is beautiful!