Interior Lighting

Ensuring we can do our daily tasks comfortably day or night.

What is Interior Lighting?

In simple terms, it’s a way of ensuring we can do our daily tasks comfortably day or night.

However, it is also what we use to enhance internal spaces to highlight features and showcase our personalities to the world.

Interior lighting comes in many forms and they are constantly evolving, however, there are some fundamentals we must first cover if you’re looking to gain an understanding of lighting the interior of your property.

What are the 3 Types of Lighting?

Ambient, Accent and Task lighting. These are the fundamental lighting types and are used in both interior and exterior lighting designs.

Ambient Lighting

The low intensity “background light” helps set the mood of a room. Like in a kitchen you would have a lot of natural like from windows during the day or bright white lights of a night.

Accent Lighting

Is used when you wish to highlight a particular area. Like a feature wall or piece of architecture.

Task Lighting

Task lighting is as the name suggests, to shine a light on a specific task someone is performing. Like studying at a desk or the light in the range hood over the stovetop.

Layers of Home Lighting

What does it mean to layer lighting?

Layering light is all about combining different kinds of light to create a particular mood or feel. It’s not only domestic interiors that use layered light to achieve a desired atmospheric effect. For instance, you might have a low ambient background light in a study with a small floor-mounted lamp featuring a piece of artwork on the wall. The options are endless.

What are the Different Types of Interior Lights?

Types of lights or often determined by their use and what room they are being used in.

Some types are listed but not limited to

ceiling lights
chandeliers
pendant lights or hanging
wall sconse lights
flush mount down lights
floor lamps
desk lamps

Types of lighting can vary by room but they are best categorised by room and use.

kitchen
dining
living room
bedroom
bathroom
laundry
home office
theatre rooms all have different requirements for the light we choose.

For instance, a kitchen requires bright white lights that are fixed above the kitchen benches so as to give maximum light for food preparation. They need to be positioned so shadows are not cast over the food but also must be energy efficient.

So you will often see white LED overhead lights, either hanging pendant lights or LED downlights in the ceiling.

We are building a RoombyRoom interior lighting guide for you.

Light Quality

As with the number of light types and uses, there is also an enormous variance in interior lighting quality, from cheap plastic to craftsman masterpieces using quality materials and fittings. The choice is yours.

Designer Interior Lighting

When your interior lighting designs call for that extra special look that only the highest quality will do, then designer lighting brands offer elegance and will offer consistency throughout the house.

Interior Accessories

As well as the light fittings and fixtures go into a large part of your lighting design, the other very important aspect of lighting is the

Bulbs
Switches
Dimmers
Outlets

Choosing the right bulbs not only create the perfect ambience in a room but also can play a dramatic part in your environmental footprint.

The various types of light bulbs are

CFL
Fluorescent
Halogen
Incandescent
Integrated LED
Krypton
LED
Xenon

Each has there unique attributes and specific functions when illuminating your space to be the most comfortable and functional you can make it.

In the following pages and articles, we will discuss specific lighting and review lights for special purposes.