Planning your lighting layout is essential to getting the fittings right the first time. There's many steps to the process, choosing the light, making sure it's the right height and gives off ample light as well as getting it installed. 

Depending on the size, purpose and aesthetic of your room, depends on how many lights/lumens you will need. 

For example, if you are creating a cosy corner for reading or other close up hobbies, you wouldn't want a large ceiling light in the middle, you'd want an over the shoulder floor lamp, or even a smaller task light table lamp.

 Also known as ambient lighting, or even sometimes the 'big light'. General lighting is the light that you switch on to give you enough light to see when you are in the room. 

This is typically where most people's consideration's stop, the main light. It's important to consider the ambience of your room and how you want to feel while in the room.

 This generally refers to table lamps, floor lamps or picture lights. These can be used to highlight objects in your space or simply add a touch of interest and dynamics. 

This is the most creative form of lighting and brings depth to your space. If you have a smaller room, consider low mood lighting as it will give the illusion of a bigger space.

Try altering the height of your chosen lamps, this can also affect the perceived height of your room and can make a huge difference in your furniture layout and colour pallet choices for your walls.

The lamp shade that you use is important to consider too. Darker colours will hold in more light, leaving you with a more muted and dimmed effect, whereas a lighter colour will diffuse the light around your space more effectively. 

As well as this, consider some out of the box shades. With the options of crystal or glass shades, in all different sizes and shapes, there's something for everyone if you're looking for that luxurious touch.

This is a brighter light, usually placed in the ideal area, around a comfy seat for reading or over a desk for dimmed work stations. 

Usually this lighting is switched lighting, similar to mood lighting, but with a bit more of a purpose. 

Don't overlook task lighting in the kitchen and bathroom, consider hanging pendants over your kitchen island, with the added help of seeing your task, such as cooking for cleaning, also think about bathroom safe mirror lights, for those early mornings and late night showers. 

If you're still curious about elements such as lighting colour, type of bulb or lighting your room by size, then head back to our FAQ page and read more.