The kitchen is a part of the house that is used a lot of the time. From cooking and eating, to entertaining, and doing work at the table. So when it comes to lighting, first off, it should be practical. When you’re in your kitchen, you don’t want to be squinting over poorly lit pots and pans.
Secondly, it should be welcoming and bright too. It needs to have a little warmth and appeal, allowing people to relax, especially if the kitchen is somewhere that you might settle down to work. And obviously, it must work with your current room design. The modern kitchen could do with fresh and crisp lighting, whereas vintage kitchens ideally suit warmer tones.
If you want to add a bit of brightness, then adding a splash of light in the form of LED strip lighting can really bring your cabinets to life. LED lighting is far cheaper to run than halogen equivalents, and uses 90% less energy, designed to last up to 25,000 hours, while a halogen will only deliver a meagre 2,000 hours, that’s if you’re lucky.
As LED lights evolve, so does the number of options you have, from LED shelf lighting and strip lighting to bulbs and kitchen spotlights. They’re available in a variety of colour temperatures too, which means you can buy ones that cast a different shade of light for whatever scene you are trying to set. When you’re cooking you can set them bright, but a romantic meal might call for a littler duller lighting to give that right setting.
Choosing the right LED light all depends on what you use your kitchen for mostly. Spotlights are ideal for a one area task because of their narrow, focused beam angle. Shelf lighting for example will just brighten up the whole room, bringing a new dimension to the areas you can light.
I guess it all just depends on the way you use your kitchen, more than just cooking, and the style of your kitchen. LED lighting is the way forward though. For efficiency, it’s better for the environment, and has so many different styles to suit any kitchen decor…
A useful post. Thank you. Lighting makes a difference in all rooms but it is essential to see what you are doing while preparing and cooking in the kitchen.
good lighting makes such a difference, we have bright lighting and mood lighting in a our rooms, it really make 2 totally different atmospheres.
Great ideas thanks!
Fab ideas!
Thanks – always after tips for the home
This blog has been really useful i never realized just how much longer those LED, lights actually last, as opposed to the halogen ones.
Never knew LED lighting was so efficient, great post 🙂