Indoor Lighting

Transform the Ambience of your Home with Indoor Lighting

Transform the allure of your interior furnishings with the power of lighting. Second to a fresh coat of paint, replacing dated light fixtures with contemporary indoor lighting will enhance the design of your home. Freshen up the space with well placed recessed lights to highlight accent chairs or brighten up your sofa; then use a decorative ceiling fan or chandelier to complete the look with feature lighting. Whether you are building your commercial work space from the ground up, or updating your kitchen with under cabinet tape lighting, AQLIGHTING has the interior light fixtures you’ll need to complete your project. Talk to one of our professional electricians or designers on staff to get helpful guidance on accent lighting or ways to improve your energy savings with LED lighting alternatives.

Lighting can change the entire feel of your home. Using the wrong kind of lighting can make your living room feel small or maybe even cold and empty. Be aware that there are several categories of lighting. Designers and architects may disagree about the terminology but they all agree on the utter importance of creating a balanced lighting design. Personally, I break it down to general, ambient, task, mood, and accent. Each type of light adds a supporting layer. When designed carefully the lighting in your home can create the perfect, balanced ambiance for each room.

General Lighting

General lighting is the main lighting in every room. This could be recessed cans, a chandelier or even natural light from a window. General lighting is more for function than aesthetics. You should be able to walk into any room and have enough light to easily see everything and walk about safely.

Ambient Lighting

Although ambient lighting is closely related to general lighting, think of it as the 2nd layer of lighting in a room. More often than not general lighting is direct light whereas ambient lighting is typically indirect lighting. A wall sconce or an illuminated coffer ceiling are great examples of ambient lighting. Ambient lighting should reflect off of a hard surface like the ceiling or walls and depth and tranquility to your room.

Task Lighting

When most people think of task lighting they think of a desk lamp or undercabinet kitchen lighting. That’s exactly what it is. Brighter than ambient lighting, task lighting directs light to the work surface like a counter or desk. Sometimes task lighting can serve double duty. Dim your under cabinet lights in the evening and it turns into ambient light. This is just another layer adding drama and depth to your home.

Mood Lighting

Mood lighting creates the balance between general and ambient lighting. It can be something like a floor lamp or a table lamp. Mood lighting should be stylish yet functional and should add warmth, creating an inviting atmosphere.

Accent Lighting

The purpose of accent lighting is to illuminate an object or a feature in a room. It doesn’t just highlight artwork or decorations it also provides another layer of reflective illumination or indirect light. There are many types of fixtures that produce accent type lighting. A couple examples would be a recessed light or track head spotlighting an object like a vase or sculpture.

Conclusion

Now that you know the different types of lighting, you can see how important it is to combine multiple types of lighting in a single room. Doing so will transform a plain unattractive room into a warm inviting space that welcomes everyone.

FAQ’s

How much light do I need?

This is one of the most asked questions about lighting. The problem is, it is very open ended. How much light you need depends on many factors. One of the main factors is what is the purpose of the room? Obviously, a kitchen or a bathroom requires more light than a bedroom. There are other factors like how high is the ceiling, are the colors of the room light and reflective or dark, and where are the light sources? Is there just 1 main light source in the middle of the room or are the sources spread out like multiple recessed cans and layering like task lights? This is an extremely important question to ask and it should be addressed at the right time of your construction. Preferably during the planning phase however at the very least before your rough electrical is complete and your walls and ceilings are closed up. Waiting too long to ask this question can be very costly.

What is color temperature and what one should I use?

Before LED bulbs we rarely asked this question. We would just buy a standard light bulb and screw it in. Once in a while we would screw the bulb in, turn on the light and 1 bulb would be yellowish and 1 bulb would be bluish. That is color temperature! There is a wide range of “white light” so it is measured in Kelvins (K). Most people prefer between 2700K-3000K for their homes. A commercial office is usually around 3500K-4500K. A laboratory may be between 5000K-6500K. So a 2700K bulb might be great for your living room and a 5000K bulb might be perfect in your workshop. Don’t just throw a bulb in your cart without being certain about the color temperature or you may be unpleasantly surprised when you turn it on.