Lighting has a lot of influence on the overall look of a place. It can go from ominous and uninviting to warm and welcoming just with a single light fixture. Thus, when decorating your house, you should really consider how you plan on lighting your home.
For different parts of the house, there are areas that will require different lighting styles from you. For example, the bedrooms might need dimmer lighting while living rooms should have brighter ones.
You have to be sensitive to these when thinking of what sort of lighting fixtures to get in your home. On that note, below are some lighting tips you can try out for a variety of areas in your house.
Check them out and give them a try. See for yourself whether they work with your house.
Foyer, Halls, and Stairways
The first things you need to look at for lighting are the intermediary or transient areas of your home that you don’t necessarily lounge around at. These areas are like your foyer, the halls, and the stairways.
For the Foyer
Your foyer is what will welcome your guests to the house. Thus, you need to make sure that you have welcoming lighting schemes in this area. One common foyer lighting fixture is chandeliers.
The good thing about using chandeliers to light your foyer is that they also double up as a decoration for your entryway.
If you’re going to be using a hanging lighting fixture in your foyer, you should make sure that the bottom of the lighting fixture is at least 7 feet from the ground. That way, it doesn’t feel disruptive in any way for you or other people in your house.
For the Halls
There are several ways you can spice up your hallway’s lighting designs. If you have a fairly simple hallway design, then you can use the lighting fixture as a simple, but still eye-catching, decoration in the halls.
Aside from that, you can try and highlight specific areas in the hallway using wall lighting. For example, if you have any coat hooks or pictures and paintings on the walls and want to emphasize them a bit, then a subtle wall light can help make this possible.
If your hallways are particularly dark, then install ceiling light fittings in strategic spacing so that it illuminates your hallway better. However, if you have darker corners, then you might want to place a small table and a table lamp to make the space more inviting.
For the Stairways
It is important that your stairways are appropriately lit so that no one will end up tripping and falling on your staircase. If you want to be particular about it but extra safe and are willing to put in the time and effort, then try and observe your stairways during particular moments of the day.
That way, you can observe just how dim or lit your stairs are during different times of the day. Then, you can plan accordingly.
Ideally, natural lighting is the best for staircases. However, if you need to supplement some lighting on your stairs or simply want that subtle additional pizzaz, then you can install more light fixtures. Make sure that the design doesn’t clash with your home’s design scheme, so they blend in better.
Living Room
The thing with a living room is that it doesn’t have one single purpose. That said, it might be a bit more challenging figuring out how exactly you want to light it.
There are times when you use the living room to hang out with friends you have over, but at other times you may use it to relax with a good book or listen to some music.
Thus, you should make sure that you take note of the activities that you tend to do in your living room. For one, you might want to invest in some floor reading lights that you can use if you need some task lighting in the living room.
Aside from that, ambient lighting might be more your jam if you find that your living room has a lot of natural light.
Dining Room
The key to lighting the dining room is focusing on how you want to light your dining room table. According to Halcyon Lights, the dining room table is often used for eating, but sometimes it’s used for other activities as well. Sometimes, it’s used to finish homework or paperwork, sometimes to prepare food, and more.
A chandelier is also a fine idea for a dining room lighting fixture. No matter what your choice of lighting is though, just make sure that you reduce the glare of the lights on the table. If this is a problem for you, then installing a dimmer can help significantly in reducing the glare in your dining room.
Kitchen
When preparing your food in the kitchen, you will need sufficient lighting to make the task easier to accomplish. You will need some ambient lighting that will not only serve as a means to create the atmosphere of the kitchen, but they will also serve as your primary source of light.
Strip lights are a great form of lighting that you can add in your kitchen, particularly in the work areas of the kitchen. As long as you have task lighting in the right areas of the kitchen, it will be easier for you to prepare food in your kitchen.
Bathrooms
The mirrors or vanities are the areas of the bathroom that you probably want task lights to be in the most. This is where you’d be looking and freshening yourself up, of course, so they need more focused lighting.
The rest of the bathroom can do with ambient lighting. Natural lighting is also a good idea, as long as you’re sure nobody can see you in your birthday suit.
There are all sorts of lighting designs out there that people can try, but not all of them fit the aesthetics and needs of particular areas of the house. With that said, this article should help you find better ideas on how to light specific parts of your home.
Try them out for yourself and see which ones fit both your preferences as well as the aesthetics of your home. Not to mention if they light the appropriate parts of your home. Good luck with the search!
