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Building a Home Lighting Design Dilemma

Should I add Recessed lighting

3 years ago

We are in the process of finalizing our floor plan and I can’t decide whether or not I should add recessed lighting in the great room or if the lights on the ceiling fans will be sufficient enough. Also looking at adding them in the eating nook? I have added floor plan/picture of model home/potential furniture layout. Please help! Thank you in advance!

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Comments (4)

res2architect
3 years ago
IMO there is no worse place to locate a light fixture than the bottom of a ceiling fan.

The first thing I would do is light the walls with adjustable recessed fixtures but it looks as if you have 3 TV's so I wouldn't know where to start.
formulaross20
3 years ago
The light fixtures in your brochure pics are way to glary. Definitely not subtle. I wouldn't want to live with them. Our great room is some similarly sized to yours and we have the fan lights plus six 6" can lights, two cans skimming the fireplace brickwork and four cans spaced on a larger square pattern around the room, all on dimmers. The newer pancake LED lights have the light source even with the ceiling surface, not recessed, if you use them you will be creating glare as well. I choose to use the recessed cans and retrofit them with LED lamps to get the best of both, recessed LED lighting. Our ceiling fan has three 40W equivalent LED's on the bottom, and four 60W equivalent LED's on top, all behind milky glass. Everything in the house is 3000K. The fan lights are fine for TV watching, and we don't use the extra can light normally, but at family gatherings opening presents we do need the extra light.
Jaimi Fitz thanked formulaross20
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seosmp--I will have UCL. It's in my current kitchen and love how it lights the backsplash and removes the dark recesses from the counter, but I don't think it's enough for task lighting too, hence my desire to place the cans half over the counter and half over the floor. Do you think this is a good placement? Or not? I haven't decided on 6in vs 4 in yet... gpraceman--That's a great idea to try one out. I haven't done that. Can I DIY it with my current cans? (I'm not DIY savvy!) palimpsest--The can over the passageway was going to be an "eyeball" to highlight art on the wall beside the fridge. I have changed that now, however. I also eliminated the 2 cans as you mentioned and have brought everything into line. Thanks for the tip about the "grid." I hadn't thought of it that way. How far apart should recessed be placed? This is a huge open concept kitchen/living/dining so that makes it extra challenging!
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In my own limited DIY experience, mounting in or on the tile will be a whole lot less problematic than the mirror. It will be annoying, but the time is negligible in the grand scheme of things. That doesn't mean your contractor will like it and may make it take longer and cost more than is really reasonable. He/she really should have consulted you first, so that is his mistake. But, he may still make it more difficult than it really is. Another option might be to get a directional ceiling fixture and point it toward the wall/tile and have it reflect back to where a person would stand and use the vanity. A down light, as I am sure you probably know as a photographer, in the middle of the room will not reflect a lot of bounce light and even less to be useful where someone stands to look in a mirror. It will be great back light! ;-) It's a problem that is a shame you have to solve so late in the game. Unless you are really agnostic about the lighting in the bathroom, you aren't going to be happy with any of these solutions. You will pay now or later to be happy. make them change it now while workers are on hand. If you really are not _that_ worried about the issue, but you want to avoid the downlight effect, then cut both down lights (including the one over the toilet) and put a nice, bright, modern flush mount fixture in the center-ish of the room.. You have to figure out how much you can and can't live with. That my opinion. Joe
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Jaimi Fitz
Original Author
3 years ago
Sorry for the confusion i will only have one tv centered on the large wall between fans the other two squares are for artwork/pictures. Thank you so much for the ideas and info, this whole process is over my head.. lol
res2architect
3 years ago
I would light the artwork with adjustable or wall-washer recessed lights placed about 2 ft from the walls. It will be tough to put recessed lights near the fans because they might throw moving shadows.

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