Information About Lighting Your Home

The light in your home can have a big impact on your level of comfort and on the functionality of your living space. Having many lighting options and ample natural light can ensure that your house looks spacious, clean and inviting. Great lighting, along with proper staging, helps sell a home. Light is handled differently in each room of the house. This room-by-room lighting guide will help you design a new construction house that is well-lit and attractive.

Living Room

The living room is a place in the home that relies heavily on natural light. Often, living rooms have large picture windows that allow light to enter during daylight hours. When designing a living room with a large picture window, take into consideration the amount of heat that will enter the home when direct sunlight shines inside. Low-e coatings prevent solar heat gain and keep the room comfortable without requiring you to draw the shades at the brightest part of the day.

Kitchen

The kitchen is a part of the home that needs light from many different sources in order to be a functional space. Task lighting helps people chop food and perform food-preparation tasks on the countertop. Track lighting and recessed lighting on multiple light switches gives homeowners options when using the kitchen. Homeowners who want to turn down the lights for their meal times can also install dimmers that make it possible to dine in low-lighting.

Pendant lighting adds an artfulness to the kitchen. Some homeowners install pendant lighting over their counters, others install pendant lighting over their dining room table.

Bathroom

The bathroom is another room, like the kitchen, where different forms of lighting can be very useful. Bathrooms are rooms where many accidents take place. Slips and falls are an especially common form of bathroom accident, but adequate lighting can help with this problem.

To ensure that the bathroom has enough lighting to keep people safe, it's important to install a variety of light fixtures. Pendant lighting over an island or a sink adds an element of intrigue, while recessed lighting makes it possible to focus light in all parts of the bathroom where accidents often take place.

The shower, bathtub and toilet are all parts of the bathroom where accidents frequently take place. Keeping these parts of the bathroom well-lit is important. Installing multiple light switches gives bathroom users control over how and where light is focused in the room.

Bedroom and Guestroom

The bedroom is a part of the home where small lamps are useful for creating a pleasant atmosphere. Many find it helpful to connect light switches to outlets, so that one or two lamps can be turned on with a light switch at the door.

Langford homeowners who want to get creative can install pendant lighting over their bed, for late night reading. Recessed lighting in the bedroom is very practical because different fixtures can be turned on separately from one another, enabling the homeowner to turn on any lights they want at any time.

Hallways

Hallways get very dark and can be a place where household accidents happen, so lighting the hallway well is very important. Recessed lighting and track lighting both work especially well in hallways. Homeowners on a budget appreciate track lighting because it's effective and relatively inexpensive.

If you're a homeowner who would like to make the best lighting choices for your home, work with your contractor. Your home builder can help you determine what lighting will work best in your new home.