Make The Most Of Your Bathroom With Wall Lights
If, like most people, your bathroom is simply a ‘pit-stop’ room at either end of your day, you’re missing a trick or two. Simply by paying attention to the way you illuminate what is possibly the smallest room in your home can make an enormous difference to the way you feel about it. Bathroom lighting is a sorely neglected art, which is such a shame because something as simple and undemanding as bathroom wall lights could change the way you start your day.
For both ambience and functionality, wall-mounted bathroom lights really do offer the best of both worlds – providing that you choose and use them properly. When it comes to choice, you’ll be spoilt; there are styles and designs out there to satisfy even the pickiest designer; however correct installation of bathroom wall lights is key to getting the best out of them.
Before rushing out and buying those fabulous bathroom lights, however, you need to check out the European Bathroom Lighting Regulations. These regulations specify what type of electrical equipment can be used in various areas of the room – all electrical equipment, including lighting, designed for bathroom use must be zone marked. Make sure you choose your light fittings correctly.
If, like the majority of us, you are the proud owner of a less-than spacious bathroom, you might find that wall lights – especially if they are linked to a dimmer switch outside the room – provide all the lighting you need. Well chosen and sited lights will not only afford good general light levels they will also provide more than adequate task lighting.
Choosing halogen or LED lamps will ensure that the light ‘temperature’ is as close as possible to natural daylight, which will be a great help when shaving or applying make up. However, the really important consideration is how you position these lights – you are aiming to do away with shadows, which, when they fall on your face will a) make you look dreadful and b) make daily grooming tasks more difficult.
Light fittings around the mirror should cast light in four directions, that is, from above and below and from either side, in order to eliminate those pesky shadows. Hollywood style mirrors had their basis in functionality! To achieve this happy state of affairs in less than movie-star style, place one wall light above the mirror, and one either side at around eye level. If your mirror is large, say 1 metre across or more, you will find that the side lights don’t provide adequate illumination. In this instance, an overhead light will fill in the gaps.
So, that’s the task lighting sorted; now to sort out the ambience. By switching your bathroom light fittings separately you will achieve a truly versatile system. For shaving or applying make up, just switch on the wall lights both above and beside the mirror but, when languishing in the bath, forget those side lights and just turn on the wall light above the mirror. If you have a dimmer switch, which will need to be located outside of the bathroom, you can have the lights down nice and low too.
For real mood lighting, just add a few candles!
Tags: bathroom wall light, bathroom wall lighting, Bathroom Wall Lights
