It can be quite confusing to plan out your lighting for your home. In fact, the lighting in your home is a project in itself. You need to carefully think about your needs and the way you want to feel in various zones in your home.
In this article, I will share with you how I planned the lighting in my home in just 3 steps.
Enjoy!
Step 1: Get your interior design at least 75% completed and be clear about the zones in your home
It is important to have a clear idea of your interior design before you proceed with your lighting. This is so that you can plan all the lighting in your home better, reducing the chances of regretful decisions and wasted expenses.
However, if you have a very clear idea about what sort of lighting you want at the start, feel free to plan your lighting at the same time when you are creating the interior design for your home (either by yourself or with the help of an interior designer).
Step 2: Decide on the Wattage required for each zone
Now that your interior design is done/almost done, you have a clear idea where you want your dining room, living room, study area, bedrooms, and perhaps even a reading corner to be at. This is the time you can start planning your lighting, because your lighting choices will be dependent on the zones they are catered for. The first thing to do is to decide on the Wattage and Lumens you need for each zone. This step is VERY important because it will be very unpleasant to have a light that is way too bright or way too dim. Not planning the wattage before you get your lighting may lead to you needing to repurchase your various lighting and this will lead to money being wasted unnecessarily.
Please also note that the Wattage of LED lights is different from the Wattage of Incandescent lights. 1 Wattage in a LED light bulb can produce 70-100 lumens/watt. This means that LEDs are about 5-6 times more efficient at producing light than incandescent bulbs. Therefore, if you are recommended to get a 10W light by your interior designer, you need to double check if they are referring to an LED light bulb or an incandescent light bulb or a halogen light bulb.
Personally, I have been recommended a ridiculously high light wattage for certain zones in my home, therefore I am glad that I did my due diligence by doing a bit more research on whether the recommended wattage was really suitable or not, when it came to LED lighting.
You can refer to the table below for a gauge on how much Wattage is required for each zone in your home.
| Size of zone | Example (The following examples are just gauges. Please measure the dimensions of your zones to be more accurate) | Recommended Lumens | Incandescent Watts (Estimated) | LED Watts (Estimated) |
| 1-2sqm | Mini Entrance foyer, Mini Walkway | 375 | 25 | 4-6 |
| 2-4sqm | Bomb shelter, service yard | 450 | 40 | 6-10 |
| 4-6sqm | Reading Corner | 800 | 60 | 11-14 |
| 6-8sqm | Dining Room | 1100 | 75 | 15-20 |
| 8-10sqm | Smaller Bedrooms, Study Area | 1600 | 100 | 20-25 |
| 10-12sqm | Living Area, Kitchen | 2600 | 150 | 25-30 |
| 12-14sqm | Bigger Bedroom(s) | 3000 | 200 | 25-35 (If this is for your bedroom, my advice is to a get dimmable light) |
Table: Recommended Lumens for each zone and Lumens to Light Source Watts Conversion Chart
A tip to make things easier when it comes to lighting is to just use LED lights for everything. This is because LED lights use less energy and are known to last longer. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, LEDs use at least 75% less power than incandescent bulbs and last up to 25 times longer. If you are lazy like me and want to minimize the effort of having to change your lighting, it only makes sense to get LED light instead of incandescent lighting.
Based on the table above, here is the amount of LED Watts I estimated for each zone in my home:
- Entrance Foyer = 10W
- Walk Way = 5W
- Kitchen = 25-30W
- Living area = Around 30W
- Each Bathroom = Around 10W ceiling light
- Each Small Bedroom = Around 20W
- Master Bedroom = Around 20-30W
- Bomb Shelter = 10W
- Service Yard = 10W
- Dining Area = Around 20W
Step 3 – Plan out the lighting design/Source for your lights
Once you have identified the amount of LED Wattage required for each zone, it is now time for the fun part – Planning out your lighting design and sourcing for your lights, within your budget! (P.S. Your budget for your lighting should be set early on in your interior design journey.
If you have not set your budget for your lighting yet, to help you out, here is a Home Renovation Expenses Tracker for you to key in your estimated budget for your lighting and your other home renovation expenses.)
I placed these 2 tasks (Planning out the lighting design and Sourcing for your lights) together in one step because you will likely do both tasks at the same time, hence I feel that it is a more feasible approach this way.
Take note of existing light points where you can attach the ceiling lights at. Make use of as many existing light points as possible – Doing so limits the amount of light points you need to install or shift) will help you save even more money. Then, it is time to source for lighting ideas – The best place to do this is via Google and Pinterest.
Pro tip:
Be clear about the design that you want for your home before you source for your lighting.
What sort of lighting style are you going for? Something Eclectic, Scandinavian, Mid-Century Modern or Japandi? Do you want some woodiness, some rattan, some mid-century, or do you want to keep it simple? What about the metallic accents? Do you want the hardware to be all black, rose gold, gold, silver, brass, or a mixture of various metals?
Do you want your lighting to match the furniture in your home or do you want it to be a statement piece? Do you want cove lighting to have more of a hotel feel? What about having lighting that is not at the ceiling – perhaps you can create the cove lighting effect below your TV console, above your wardrobe or even above your vanity mirror. If you want something more fancy, Does your budget allow for the type of lighting you want?
See, there’s so many things to consider when planning out the lighting design for your home. Do take your time with this before you make your purchase because you do not want to regret your decision! This is why Step 1 (Get your interior design at least 75% completed) in this article is so important before you deep dive with your lighting planning.
For me, I got my lighting from various locations – a local lighting shop, online and also at IKEA. Also, even though I went in-store to get some of my lighting, I looked up all of them online before I decided to go down to get them. I used tools like Google Slides and Pinterest to visualise my lighting choices better. I used Pinterest to shortlist the styles and vibes that I wanted to get out of my lighting. As for Google Slides, I used it to make a mood/visual board where I placed various lighting design styles and pasted them against the interior design visuals of my home, so I can see visually if the lights are suitable or not.
Also since I was on a budget, I did not do any of those fancy recessed lighting or cove lighting stuff. However, some of the lighting that I did definitely has the cove lighting effect! More details on this will be shared below.
Here is a breakdown of how I planned my lighting (Ceiling lights, Wall lights, Ceiling fans with lights, Accent lights).
B. Ceiling fans with lights
The simplest way to start planning the lighting types you should get is to identify where you want to place your ceiling fans at. As ceiling fans come in a limited range of design, it is good to start with ceiling fans so you will not be so overwhelmed with all the design choices out there.
I personally love ceiling fans because they can help to circulate air over a bigger area and they do not take up any floor space. However, if you do not like ceiling fans, you can opt for standing fans instead. You can even choose to omit out ceiling fans if your home is very windy.
The zones where you will want to install ceiling fans are likely the zones where the people in your home will spend the most time. Hence, a good amount of air circulation is required in these zones. In my home, the zones where I decided to have ceiling fans are my living room, study area, all the bedrooms and my study room. These are the zones that the people in my home will spend most of the time at, hence it makes sense to install ceiling fans at these zones.
I will elaborate more about each zone in the next section where I share a breakdown of my lighting choices.
I made an exception for my kitchen because a kitchen can get quite greasy and I do not want to add an extra chore of needing to clean the kitchen ceiling fan. However, if you really want to have a fan in your kitchen, feel free to do so! It is your home afterall and you should do whatever you want (with good reason and within budget of course).
On a side note, there are some of you who prefer having ceiling fans without any light source. If so, you need to take note of this when you are planning out the rest of the lighting in each zone.
A. Remaining Lighting
Now that the ceiling fans with lights are in place, I will now share a breakdown of how I planned the lighting (including the ceiling fans with lights) for all the zones in my home.
i. Entrance
For the entrance, I got a ceiling light that has a mid-century modern-ish slanted design. I thought that this compliments the design of the entrance well, where one wall is white paint and the other wall is laminated. I also did not want to incur more costs by changing the lighting point such that it is more centred and hence, I thought that the slanted design of this ceiling light fit the entrance perfectly.
I also took the opportunity to install some accent lights at my entrance area, so that the items I am displaying there can be accentuated more.
ii. Walkway
For the walkway, the lighting point is already exactly at the center and therefore, I chose a simple and classical ceiling light for it.
iii. Kitchen
What type of lighting is best for a kitchen? My main requirements for my kitchen lighting is that it should be practical and easy to clean. I found my ideal kitchen lighting from IKEA.
The lighting I chose from IKEA for my kitchen is pretty straightforward and only consists of one ceiling light. The great part about this ceiling light is that it has two lightbulb sockets. This means that if one of the two light bulbs attached to it gets faulty, I can still depend on the other lightbulb to light up the kitchen. The ceiling light’s simple design also makes it such a breeze to clean, which is very important in the kitchen.
iv. Study Area
The study area consists of just 1 ceiling fan with a 3-color (warm, neutral, cool) light. The warm light is great for moments when I want to have a more relaxed atmosphere and the neutral light is great for moments when I need to focus more on my work. I seldom use the cool toned light.
v. Living Area
This is the most challenging part of my home to plan lighting for. I knew that I wanted to have various types of lighting in my living room to cater to different moods. If I want to work and watch TV at the same time, I prefer it to be brighter. If I want to be in a very chill mood, I prefer to have a dimmer light. I also need to cater to moments where I want warm lighting that is not too dim and not shining directly at me from above. I also wanted to have some accented lighting pieces to make my living room look more interesting.
Here’s how I planned my living area to cater to all my needs mentioned above:
Ceiling fan
I got a ceiling fan in the exact same model as my study area’s ceiling fan. This is because my study area is open and is just behind my living area. Hence, having 2 of the same fans make the 2 zones look more unison with each other.
Rattan light
I wanted to have at least one outstanding piece of lighting in my home that does not look too garish. Hence, I opted to have a rattan light at the reading nook corner of my living area. The rattan light complements the space so well!
Accent light at the TV Console Cabinet
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- My interior designer proposed to have an accent light (in the form of LED strips) below the TV Console Cabinet. I am glad we went with it because it enhances the cinematic vibe of the living area when we are watching movies at night (with only this light switched on).
vi. Dining room
The lighting for the dining room consists of 1 ceiling light (which is also a mini ceiling fan) and one track light. Most of the time, I will turn on the main ceiling light. However, I am trying to reduce this as the mini ceiling fan light consists of a fixed bulb. This means that it will be very troublesome for me to change the dining room ceiling light if it gets faulty.
However, if and when my dining room’s ceiling light gets faulty, I can always depend on my track lights (which I can easily change on my own if any of them gets faulty). I also love how my track lights shine on solo art pieces on the wall, which makes the wall feel like an art gallery.
vi. Bathrooms
I wanted a fuss-free ceiling light for each bathroom where I could easily change the lightbulb on my own. I got the same light design and lightbulbs for both bathrooms from IKEA.
I also added LED lights at the vanity mirror to make it more fancy. Sometimes if I want a more dim atmosphere in the bathroom, I will opt to switch the LED light on instead of the ceiling light.
vii. Master Bedroom
I knew that I wanted 1 main ceiling light and 1 corner light (where it is not too glaring for the eyes, especially when I am lying in bed). The main light also acts as a ceiling fan, is 3-color-toned and dimmable, so I can change the color and dim the light according to my mood. The corner light is for moments when I do not want light shining down on me – which is at least 90% of the time. I love the dimness of the corner light and it is my favorite light to switch as I am lying on my bed.
I also have a LED light installed in my wardrobe. This has been really useful especially when my husband is sleeping and I do not want to wake him up.
Another light source I installed in my master bedroom are the 2 bedside wall lamps that I love so much. I love the retro hotel vibe this gives to my bedroom.
vii. Each Small Bedroom (Guest Bedroom + Common Bedroom)
The guest bedroom only has 1 ceiling fan-with-dimmable-3-color-light (Same goes for the other common bedroom in the house). This is because the common bedrooms are more compact in size as compared to the master bedroom. I also installed a LED light into the built-in wardrobe in the guest bedroom. If the user does not want to turn on the ceiling light, they can simply slide open the wardrobe door and switch on the wardrobe light instead.
viii. Bomb Shelter/Service Yard
The lighting for the bomb shelter and service yard are pretty straightforward. All it needs is a straightforward and simple ceiling light. However, I do regret installing a ceiling light with a fixed bulb. This means that if the bulb becomes faulty, I need to get a totally new ceiling light altogether.
Pro tip:
If you want to reduce costs and unnecessary time spent being concerned about your lights, unless you are a pro lighting engineer or you enjoy tinkering around with wires, please get lights that any layman can easily remove and attach the lightbulbs from.
That’s it! Planning the lighting for your home can be quite a tedious process but as long as you break it down in the the 3 steps mentioned in this article, the planning process will be a breeze. Have fun planning and remember to track all your renovation expenses!