Let there be Light. Top Tips for your Home
Lighting is a key feature to any home and in theory is easy enough; you purchase a light, switch it on and voila, but are you getting the most out of the lighting in your home? Check out our top tips for highlighting the best assets in your room and the lighting fixtures to be on the lookout for.
The Lighting Lingo:
Ambient Lighting:
The most common form of artificial lighting within a home, ambient lighting essentially takes the place of daylight within a room. Rather than highlight specific areas, ambient lighting is set up to create a flat, uniform lighting level across space and takes many fixture forms.
*Top Tip* for ambient lighting in your home is to get a dimmer switch installed so you can control the overall brightness of the room as a whole, moving from bright to warm and cozy.
Task Lighting:
From cooking, through to putting on makeup, our homes are filled with everyday tasks. Task lighting is the lighting that is positioned to help you carry out these tasks, be it stand along reading lights or under cupboard lighting, its focused on illuminating areas where you carry our your day-to-day tasks.
*Top Tip* Have task lighting on an individual switch so that the light is only on at times when you are carrying out your job.
Accent Lighting:
Most commonly used to highlight specific areas or features within a room, accent lighting is a great tool for setting a certain tone/mood. This is the ideal form of lighting (additional to general) if you want to bring particular attention to objects around your home for example sculptures, artwork, book shelving, and is also perfect for bringing focus to areas around your garden such as water features.
*Top Tip* Don’t forget to consider areas where light will bounce, reflect, and sparkle off of objects.
Lighting Tips By Room:
Living Room
The modern living room is home to a huge range of day-to-day tasks; watching, reading, tv, eating, and family conversations, it’s arguably the hub of the house. As such the lighting chosen for your living room needs to be chosen with all its functionalities in mind and layering (using multiple types of) lighting should be embraced. Keep the living room ambient but bright and fresh by bouncing your main lights off of the ceiling. This can be achieved by using sconce, cove lighting or track lights which are pointed to bounce off the walls. Simple floor lamps are also a great way to achieve this effect. Don’t forget that dimmer switches are a great tool for controlling overall brightness of your main living lights, allowing you to create a more cosy and warm atmosphere in the evenings.
Layer up your ambient lighting with accent lighting to highlight your favourite architecture, objects and feature pieces within the room. Alongside task lighting such as lamps in areas where you often find yourself looking for more of a focused, brighter light.
Kitchen
With the kitchen, the main focus should be achieving your optimum task lighting. Achieve this through under-cabinet lighting in key areas for food prep, spotlights and also valance lighting around other workstations such as your sink are all options.
Alongside your task lighting you want areas where people gather, and also the kitchen island to be lit with ambient lighting; for these areas top picks are pendant lighting or recessed downlights which send illumination straight down over the area. Pendant lighting also come in a huge range of styles which makes it an ideal pick if you’re looking to add some statement fixtures in your home.
Bedroom
The bedroom is the room where you go to escape and relax so your lighting should reflect this. Rather than having one central light we’d recommend using, for example, dimmable sconces within the bedroom which make for a less intrusive fitting and a less harsh lighting effect. When considering where to place them go for areas where you look to achieve the most light so rather than around the bed, surrounding the wardrobes or cabinets.
Also don’t forget your task lighting, no bedroom is complete without independent lights either bedside. For this go for the traditional tableside lamp or alternatively go more modern with wall mounted, adjustable reading lighting.
Why not add some extra sparkle to your bedroom with garland lights; they’re fun and add a lovely warm glow?
Bathroom
Ever stood in a bathroom and seen yourself in a completely different unflattering light? Many homes still utilize a central lighting area which is used to light the whole room alone and causes shadows in particular if you’re standing in front of the mirror looking to complete your grooming rituals.
Move away from the central light fittings in your bathrooms and look to employ for example multiple recessed down-lights in your bathroom which eliminate the majority of shadows, and/or focused wall mounted task lighting either side of the mirror to get the best results.
Looking for more tips for your home interiors style? Have a read of our other blogs: Click Here.
