Artificial lighting

You don’t have to be a Broadway director to stage dramatic lighting. Spotlight, floodlight, down lights, track light, wall washers, dimmers –these are just some of the fixtures and devices now available for home lighting. Once you have worked out your furniture arrangement and know what you want hung on the walls, you are ready to think theatrical and produce your lighting effects. For the family room, as for other multi-activity rooms, you will want to plan for good overall lighting that casts glare-free light on major floor areas and traffic paths. You will also want to include supplemental lightning for special activities, such as a spotlight for reading or down-lights for playing games. In addition you may want to illuminate artwork, show off display shelves, create a focal point, define a space or bathe entire wall in soft glow to make the room seem larger.

Your choice of lightning will depend on the architecture and décor of the room, as well as on the number of purposes the room serves. The ideas on these two pages feature some of the most popular lightning effects. For detail on lightning a desk see pages 66 and 67.

Put lightning effects on the right track

You can brighten an entire room or spotlight an activity area or piece of art with track lighting. The flexibility of track system, teamed with the versatility of a dimmer switch is especially helpful in a multipurpose family room. Track light can simplify things by eliminating the need for individual table or floor lamps.

The most flexible track system has a continuous open channel. Fixtures snap into the track and swivel to send beams of light wherever you want them.

This entry was posted on December 4, 2009 at December 4, 2009 and is filed under Home. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.