HOME INTERIOR DESIGN-LIVING ROOM DESIGN

Living Room Lighting

Living room lighting aims to eliminate dark rooms and enhance visibility, comfort and add to the aesthetic sense of the room. Living room light plays an important role in decorating living rooms. Changing the wall color may also warrant the change in living room lighting. Walls with light and cool colors may have different needs than the ones with deep and rich colors. Living room lighting ideas generally include layers of lighting such as general lighting, ambient lighting and task lighting. In a living room with deep colored walls, brightness is an essential point to keep in mind. General lighting such as ceiling lighting generally diffuses modest amount of light over a large area, which may be insufficient to brighten up a dark living room or living room walls in deep colors.



Ambient lighting, as the name suggests, helps to create a particular mood or ambience in the room and can be achieved by indirect lights such as down lights and up lights that seem to throw a glow of light in a flushing pattern up or down the wall and give a din glow throughout the room. They immediately attract attention. Task lighting helps you to do specific tasks efficiently. In a dark romantic living room with dim lights, you will need to use task lights that will brighten up certain work areas such as reading area and sewing area, so you have ample light while working and do not have to strain your eyes. Decorative lighting is usually of fashionable type to give the unique and rich feel to the room.





Permanent lighting fixtures such as chandeliers and sconces along with portable lighting systems such as table lamps are usually a part of decorative lighting in the living rooms. Chandeliers add sparkle to the entire living room.

There are some basics of living room interior design. The living room design idea given here are all tried and tested and will surely give a new look to your living room. The moods of the living room you want to create define the rest of the designing features. Formal living rooms use rich and more expensive material and a strict symmetry. There is little pattern in modern living room designs while exotic living rooms may use bright spicy colors and variety of textures to create unusual look. Start with redoing the small areas such as the mantle or the top of a cabinet. Take a look at your existing living room and decide what is wrong it.

A cluttered living room needs more organization. You may need to address issues like too much gap or monotony and feeling of dull, drab and dreary in the living room. Sometimes, just re-positioning your furniture and accessories in the living room can give it a new look. Small details such as candles, pottery and glasses on display and vases with flowers can bring enough interest in the living room. You may experiment with objects of varying textures, heights and shapes and create a fun look in the living room that you will love to live in. Groupings of elements should be done in such as way that they make a visual impact.





Displaying sparkling wine glasses and blue candles can look beautiful on its own but you may have to add porcelain figures and crystal figurines to a stack of leather bound books to add some fun element to them. Recycle your old possessions and everyday objects creatively to give an interesting look to your living room. Unusual teapots, polished chrome and nickel candelabra, family photos and even water cans may make good displays on the mantle above the hearth while you may display a collection of seashells to create a beautiful small island of our own around the plants potted in tray sitting on your tabletop.

Hi Annie-
I am thrilled to be writing to you because I LOVE your blog, and I finally have a BIG problem I would love your help on! We built our home two years ago, and painted our fairly large, two-story living room Ralph Lauren Reisling, and my husband and I both detest the color.


We are finally going to have the room re-painted, and would love your opinion on a color.


It looks into both our dining room...


...and kitchen, which are green, and nutmeg colored, respectfully.


I am thinking some sort of brown, and as you can tell from the pictures, my swatches are not helping me.

Can you suggest a great color that will help me tie in the dining room and living room together? We will be putting a leather sofa in the living room, and it gets bright morning light.

I would greatly appreciate your expert opinion!! Thank you so much!
- Stefanie Bradshaw, Louisville, KY


Dear Stephanie:
Ahhh, Louisville. A city that is near and dear to my heart...when my husband and I were engaged, I visited him in Louisville, where he was working on a campaign. We stayed at the utterly charming Seelbach Hotel,


and a big wedding was happening there...the lieutenant governor and Miss Kentucky? Something like that. Royalty. Anyway, it was one of my favorite weekends of all time. It was there that I also met my future right hand at the Smithsonian, who sealed his fate by saying, upon meeting me, "I love your shoes!" Awesome town.

But back to your living room. BROWN IS WRONG. I understand the impulse to go darker after that anemic yellow (Ralph, don't go screwing up my favorite color, ok?), but darker is simply not consistent with the architectural intent of this soaring space.

Light, airy, open...these are the effects you want to preserve. Especially because the side rooms (the dining room and kitchen) are rich in color, let's keep the living room light and neutral. I know it sounds like a cop-out, but it's the space, not the color, that needs to do the talking here.

Try to match the kitchen cabinets, but keep yellow out of it. This might mean you're looking at the very lightest taupes your paint manufacturer has to offer. In Benjamin Moore, take a look at Benjamin Moore's OC-35 Spanish White, shown on the innermost picture frame moulding below, or good old OC-17 White Dove, which is outside the picture frame moulding.

Either of them should look soft but NOT yellow; if it does, reject it. (Its feelings won't be hurt, I promise.)



In any other paint line, pick up swatches that look like your kitchen cabinets and see what works.

If it were me, and I had a free weekend (or a free few hundred bucks to pay someone else to do it), I'd also paint my banister and newel posts high-gloss black to emphasize the contrast between them and the walls. (Aren't the balusters black wrought iron?) But that's me.

I'd probably also change the ceiling fan to something white or silver so it doesn't draw attention to itself. But spend your time - and your money - on the walls first, and then see how you feel.

Thanks for the great question, Stephanie. This may not sound like an inspiring solution, but I guarantee you'll love the space when you banish the yellow. Keep us posted!

"Whites" photo from decorati.com, courtesy of xJavierx's photostream on Flickr.

First of all, the term "color camp" was totally misleading. Sorry about that. "Color BOOT Camp," possibly, or "Color College," "Hue University..."

In an ongoing effort to bring gravitas and respect to the field of color science, the IACCNA (International Association of Color Consultants North America) offers an intensive series of seminars to professionals in the field. If you complete them - over the course of a few years, since they're not offered all the time - complete the home assignments, take a test, and write a thesis (I doubt bossy blog will exempt me from that), you may then become an accredited member of this elite group.

The lecturer is Frank Mahnke, who has written several authoritative books about color, including Color, Environment, and Human Response. I'm looking forward to reading them, actually.

I didn't really know what to expect of the seminar, to be honest. Rachel of Hue had sung its praises, and Maria of Colour Me Happy is an IACC member. Kelly of Arte Styling is deep into the program, too.

In retrospect, I probably wanted the "argumentation" (as Frank would say) to back up the color decisions I make already, in the course of my work. I know I'm instinctively good with color, but I wanted more information about why color X looks good with color Y, etc.

I didn't quite get that. But I will. Seminar 1 was an overview of the psychological effects of color: the neuro-psychological aspects, emotional effects, and visual ergonomics...

You can maybe see how a non-professional might be disappointed.

Of the approximately 20 of us, one woman was understandably miffed that she wasn't getting the kind of information she wanted...let's just say that the "miffing" took place publicly, and loudly, and involved the slamming of a door. It was bizarre, actually. (Good thesis in there for someone interested in group dynamics.)

Anyway, despite the use of an overhead projector - remember those? - and a slide projector - remember THOSE? - there's no question that I learned quite a bit about the effects that color and light have on us.



And, almost more important, I connected with some amazing women - yep, we were all women this go-round - with whom I look forward to staying in touch. Most attendees are involved in interior design in one way or another, but there was also an expert in personal styling, an author, an automotive industry color designer, a faux painter, a floral designer, a fellow member of the national museum-recovery program...a really cool group of people.

Which was important, considering that the after-hours activity centered on dodging the ladies of the night who hang out in the Mission Valley Resort parking lot. Thankfully, not a single one of us was mistaken for one of them. I think it might have been the name tags.

They're calling my flight (THANK YOU, San Diego airport, for wireless internet), but more later -

The New York Times Magazine has a great article about staging a home today. Eventhough the article is about staging for selling purpose, there are some great tips that you can pick up for your daily life as well...

For example:

1) Start with a white sofa and go from there, as you can change the look quickly by changing the pillows.

2) Have a story, or a theme, and build from there.

3) Do and reedo until it's right.

4) Avoid matchy matchy.

5) Build characters and personality by adding pieces that reflect your lifestyles.

To read this article and watch the video, click here.



Image source: NY Times

The New York Times Magazine has a great article about staging a home today. Eventhough the article is about staging for selling purpose, there are some great tips that you can pick up for your daily life as well...

For example:

1) Start with a white sofa and go from there, as you can change the look quickly by changing the pillows.

2) Have a story, or a theme, and build from there.

3) Do and reedo until it's right.

4) Avoid matchy matchy.

5) Build characters and personality by adding pieces that reflect your lifestyles.

To read this article and watch the video, click here.



Image source: NY Times

When it comes to silk flowers we like them to look as real as possible--this is why you'll never find us buying them at Walmart!

The good ones are pricey, for the very simple reason that they tend to look almost like the real ones.

We found some at New Growth Designs that we just love. The orchids are nice and tall, so they look super dramatic. Some of them are over 5 feet tall. We like putting them on a console table, in front of a mirror along with some other accessories.

Check out some of our favorite ones:






We'll be posting these on our silk flowers section soon.

When it comes to silk flowers we like them to look as real as possible--this is why you'll never find us buying them at Walmart!

The good ones are pricey, for the very simple reason that they tend to look almost like the real ones.

We found some at New Growth Designs that we just love. The orchids are nice and tall, so they look super dramatic. Some of them are over 5 feet tall. We like putting them on a console table, in front of a mirror along with some other accessories.

Check out some of our favorite ones:






We'll be posting these on our silk flowers section soon.