Popular Sources of Home Lighting

Lighting your home properly is a very important consideration. It can have a lot to do with your overall mood and how easily you can accomplish your tasks at home. So let's review the different kinds of lighting that are available, and how you can best use them.

The first step in understanding lighting is to understand that there are two basic sources that are in use in most homes today. The first is incandescent lighting, which is produced by running current through a small wire called a filament. The light that is produced is very bright and warm, and is suitable for almost any task.

The second most common source of indoor lighting is called fluorescent lighting, and is produced when electricity passes through a glass tube that has been coated inside and filled with gas. This kind of light is very soft and gentle, but its big advantage is that it can produce up to five times as much light from the same amount of electrical current as an incandescent light.

Generally speaking, there are three levels of lighting used in the home depending on what task is being performed. For general relaxing and low-level lighting, 40 - 80 watt incandescent bulbs will work fine. For most general tasks, 100 - 150 watts will suffice. But for very specialized type of work, 180 - 300 watts may be needed.

For reading at home, it's good to have a floor lamp that is placed behind you and slightly to the left or right. If you're only going to be reading for a short while, 150 watts should be fine, but for prolonged reading 250 watts will do better to prevent eye strain and fatigue.

To light a desk or worktable, you'll most likely need plenty of illumination for the work at hand. Most often, it's best to actually have a small lamp on the desk itself to provide the best quality light.

In the bathroom, it's good to have lighting that helps eliminate shadows under your eyes, nose, and chin. That's often best accomplished with fixtures on each side of the bathroom mirror. Sometimes a fixture that has a series of smaller 25 watt bulbs can be used to good effect. You may also want to consider using some fluorescent lights here that employ soft white tubes for lighting that is most flattering.

In the kitchen, you need concentrated light on the countertops and workstations for best results. Fluorescent modular lighting often works very well under kitchen cabinets to light up your countertops. This kind of lighting tends to be even, with very few shadows, and free of the heat that often accompanies incandescent light.

By planning out your home lighting fixtures in advance and positioning them correctly in each room you can be sure to get the best lighting possible under a wide range of circumstances.

Lighting Trends for the New Year

Light is one of those basic necessities we take for granted, without it we couldn't see a thing! Lately however, lighting has been lifted into the spotlight of home improvement circles. The art of interior design can be taken to a whole new level, by employing various lighting solutions that will help in giving a certain space a totally unique atmosphere.

The art of employing lights and fixtures for accomplishing dramatic effects, designed to achieve a specific mood, have become a hot trend among home decor designers nowadays.
Ideally the lighting system should be great from both a functional and viewpoint and information show that pendant lights and similar products are taking up more and more space in stores committed to home planning.

Various styles of recessed lighting are not exactly a new innovation, but nowadays they are turning up in scenarios you might not have encountered them before - such as out on a patio, for example.

Among other widespread lighting trends right now are innumerable forms of accent lighting that may, for instance, be aimed onto a wall in order to complement the light directed by the fixtures in the ceiling or from a selection of recessed lighting.

Accent lighting is great for drawing awareness to precise features in the room, and as a rule can add amazing amounts of dimension and depth to the space. For those who want to go really cutting-edge, there is also the option to install the lighting system in such a way that it can be "programmed" for several scenarios.

Depending on the time of day, the mood you want to set, and which architectural features or things in the room you want to highlight, all can be effectively accomplished by a well designed lighting arrangement.

Particularly elaborate and expensive lighting systems are of course typically installed in official buildings like hotels, big company headquarters etc. But stylish lighting can definitely be employed in decorating privately owned homes as well. And, compared to other forms of home improvement or re-decorating, it does actually not have to be terribly expensive either.

The simple act of changing the lighting can breathe new life into your home, so why not give it a try.