Tips For Lighting Your Small Space

Lighting can be your best friend when it comes to decorating a small space. Whether it is natural or artificial light, it can make a room feel larger, more spacious, and more open.

1. Keep heavy drapery to a minimum and avoid placing furniture or plants in front of windows. Flooding a room with natural light, or letting in as much as possible given the space, will immediately make a room seem more open.

2. Though one statement table lamp can make for a great focal point to a room, avoid too many heavy lamps that take up too much real estate in a small room. Overhead lighting such as chandeliers, recessed lighting, and pendant lamps take up less precious space and are also a stylish look.

3. When choosing floor lamps for a small space, look for lamps that have more than one function. A floor lamp with a small shelf or table space that can hold a drink and a book or a picture frame saves you from adding another side table that there may not be room for.

4. Make a variety of eclectic pendant lights hung at different heights the main focus of the room. If you don’t have room for both furniture and artwork, this is a great way to incorporate style into the room without sacrificing the room that you need for a bookcase, seating, or a desk.

5. Consider sconces instead of table lamps in a small bedroom. This can either give you more room on your bedside table, or allow you to have a much smaller table or none at all.

Carefully placed lighting and using natural light to its fullest can make a space seem much larger than it actually is. Don’t be discouraged by a small space, be creative and you’ll have a wonderful space that may have gone overlooked otherwise.

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Holiday Lighting Safety Tips

Inside the house 

- Select trees that are fresh and do not contain dry or brown limbs. Keep the tree stand filled with water.

- Avoid placing trees or other live greenery near heat sources, such as fireplaces, space heaters or vents.

- Ensure that artificial trees have been tested and labeled as fire resistant.

- Check holiday lighting packages to determine the maximum number of strands that may be linked together safely. Always follow the manufacturer's directions.

- Inspect light strands to ensure there are no electrical problems or damage to the wiring before using.

- Avoid connecting light sets with different numbers of bulbs as they may have different electrical requirements.

- Don't place cords underneath rugs, furniture or other appliances. Doing so can cause cords to overheat or become frayed, possibly resulting in a fire. Also, take care when routing cords so that they do not become a tripping hazard.

- Check all extension cords for fraying, cracks or loose connections. When in doubt, replace old extension cords.

- Don't bunch lights too closely together. Doing so can generate excessive heat that can melt insulation and expose live wires.

- Turn off decorative lighting when you go to bed or leave the house.

Outside the house

- Use only lights that are specifically designed for outdoor use.

- When installing lights, use caution under overhanging power lines, especially when using a ladder. Scope the area, including the ground and overhead, before installation.

- Never staple or nail through extension cords or holiday lighting wires, as doing so could damage wires and insulation, resulting in electric shock or fire.

- Always use outdoor-rated extension cords and make sure that the current rating (in amps or "A") of the device you are plugging in does not exceed the rating on the extension cord. Overloading extension cords can cause overheating of the cord.

- Ensure that wires and lighting are not placed in areas prone to standing water or flooding.

- Check all extension cords and light strands for fraying, cracks or loose connections as they can result in electric shock or fire.

- Turn off all outdoor decorative lighting when you go to bed or leave the house.


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Reversing Ceiling Fans To Save Energy Costs in the Winter

In most homes, those without vaulted ceilings, ceiling fans can lower your energy costs in the winter. With the price of natural gas and other forms of energy surging, this savings can be substantial. To derive this benefit from your ceiling fan, you must first ensure that your ceiling fan can run in reverse (clockwise). If this is the case, please keep reading. If not, you may want to consider buying a ceiling fan that is able to run in reverse. Most of the ceiling fans sold by manufacturers, such as Fanimation Fans and Casablanca Fans, are built to be able to run in reverse.

At this point you may be asking yourself, how does a fan with the ability to run in reverse save me money in the winter? The answer isn’t perfectly intuitive but makes sense when explained. During the winter, houses with central heating systems exhaust warm air into rooms. This warm air quickly rises and pools at the top of the room against the ceiling. Many central heating systems actually exhaust the warm air right at the top of the ceiling in the first place. This warm air builds at the ceiling and eventually fills its way downward to the center of the room, where you are laying on your couch watching television. By the time the warm air makes its way to you though, the air at ceiling level is much hotter. Many BTUs are wasted heating the ceiling of your home where nothing lives but maybe a spider or two.

Ceiling fans offer a straightforward method of manually forcing the warm air at the top of the room to the bottom and center of the room where thermostats monitor room temperatures. By forcing this warm air down to the thermostat, the thermostat will not trigger the heating system as often, thus, saving you money. The air at living level will be warmer with less energy being used. Keep in mind that in most houses central heating systems can cost you between $5 and $30 per day during the winter, where as ceiling fans cost pennies per day to run.

So why does your ceiling fan need to run in reverse? Why wouldn’t I just run my ceiling fan forward? Well, the problem is that even though you’d still save energy costs by running your ceiling fan forward, you personally would feel cooler because ceiling fans work by moving air over your skin at high speeds. The key word here is feels. The air is not actually colder. The air just feels colder. This is the same principal as a wind chill effect. I’m sure if you live in the Northern half of the country, you’ve heard weathermen talk about how it’s actually 10 degrees out, but due to the wind chill factor, it’s going to feel like it’s negative twenty degrees. This is the reason that you do not want to run your ceiling fans forward to save energy costs during the winter.

You want to run your ceiling fans in reverse. By running your ceiling fans in reverse, the hot air pooling at the top of the ceiling will be forced to the outer edges of your rooms and then be forced down along the walls to the floor. After the air hits the floor, it will travel toward the center of the room and then back up through the ceiling fan once again. This will help equalize the temperature of the entire room, saving you energy costs.

Now, you may be asking yourself, I have a two story home, how does that effect this tactic? The second story of your house will likely always be hotter because hot air rises. Yes, warm air does travel up to the second level through escapes, such as a staircase. For the most part though, the first and second floors operate as separate environments with central heating piping hot air into both. Running your ceiling fans in reverse on both floors will cause a warming effect on both levels and more specifically in individual rooms. If you have a ceiling fan in your bedroom, you may find it possible to run it in reverse, shut your door causing a self-contained environment and turn your home thermostat lower at night.

The only time this method may not help lower energy costs much is when you have a large room with vaulted ceilings where the ceiling fan hangs on an extended rod in the middle of your room. In this case, the air forced upward may fall short of the full path upward, to the outer walls and then down them, netting a null effect.

If you do not have a ceiling fan that can run in reverse please call us at 760-200-5991 for a consultation today.

www.desertlighting.com

Techniques For Lighting Your Artwork

Oil paintings can be difficult to light because of the spectral highlights that are created when intense light is directed at the painting. A broad-based light source is best for lighting an oil painting. Acrylic paintings are not glossy and consequently don't have the glare problems associated with oils or artwork framed under glass. Any type of light source can be used.


Reflection and glare are often problems with artwork that has been placed behind glass. Nonreflective glass and proper placement of lighting can help solve these problems. To highlight all dimensions, sculpture is ideally lit from three different angles. Most sculpture, however, is lit by a single light directly above the piece (generally a recessed light).


The Importance of the Frame

The options for lighting a piece of art depend on how the piece is framed. A piece of art or wall sculpture that does not have a frame can be illuminated with lighting not attached to the artwork, such as a mantel light, spotlight, track light or recessed light. Small frames cannot support an attached picture light. Light them as described above, with a fixture that is not attached to the artwork. A substantial frame can support the weight of an attached picture light. When choosing a picture light, consider the frame's width and depth.


Types of Light


Incandescent Lights: Standard incandescent light bulbs create a warm color that brings out the yellows and reds in art while flattering the blues and greens. Halogen Lights: Halogens cast the purest white light, making them ideal for illuminating most art. They do generate a lot of heat, however, and must be placed far enough away that the heat doesn't affect the artwork.


Fluorescent Lights: Fluorescent lighting distorts the color of artwork, and the high level of ultraviolet rays emitted by fluorescent lights damages works of art by causing accelerated fading. Fluorescents are not recommended for lighting artwork.


Fixture Styles


Picture lights hang directly over a painting or are attached to the frame. A traditional picture light is about 3" in diameter and complements classic and traditional artwork. A slimline picture light is smaller than a traditional picture light, about 1" in diameter, and fits well with more contemporary pieces. Picture lights are available in a variety of styles and finishes and come in lengths ranging from 12" to 48". Both traditional and slimline picture lights use incandescent lightbulbs, and some are battery-powered. 


Mantel lights and spotlights are placed in front of the artwork and usually sit on a mantel or a shelf. They light the artwork from the bottom and are less noticeable than a picture light.


Track lighting is the most flexible way to light art. A track can hold several lights. Track lighting can be used to light a wall evenly from floor to ceiling or to accent one or more pieces of art.


Recessed lights lie flush with the ceiling and are very subtle, but they have a limited range of movement. Recessed lighting is commonly found in newer homes, installed when the homes are built.


Position and Intensity of the Light


Reduce Glare: Place the light at a 30-degree angle to the work of art to minimize glare. Add 5 degrees to the angle for a larger frame, to avoid casting a shadow. Subtract 5 degrees from the position to accent the texture of a painting.


Avoid Heat Damage: Place lights far enough away from a painting to avoid possible heat damage. Heat can crack oil paintings. Take special care when using hot halogen lights. To test the heat from your lights, put your hand between the art and the light source. If you can feel heat from the light, it could potentially damage an oil painting.


Intensity: The general rule for accenting a piece of art is to light it three times brighter than the rest of the room.


www.desertlighting.com