A Guide For Choosing Chandeliers For Your Dining Room

When it comes to choosing lighting for the various rooms of your home, many people can forget that these fixtures do more than just provide adequate illumination for the space - in many cases, they form attractive features of the room and, as such, need to be aesthetically pleasing themselves. If you are in the process of choosing a chandelier for use in your dining room, it is important that you take the right steps in ensuring that you make the right choice.

One of the most important aspects of choosing a chandelier for a dining room is its proportion. You need to ensure that the fixture does not dominate the table beneath it nor that it fades into the background and becomes insignificant. The general rule of thumb is that the span of the chandelier should be 12 inches shorter than the table's width for it to not look out of place. Your starting point, then, should be in measuring the width and length of the dining table (or the diameter for a round one).

Another important aspect of choosing a chandelier for a dining room is where the fixture hangs. It should be placed over the centre of the dining table, ensuring that there is a 30 to a 33 inch gap between the surface and the bottom of the fixture to ensure adequate head space. If your table is not placed in the middle of the room, you may find it easier to place a hook in the ceiling above the centre of the table and run the chandelier's chain and wiring along the ceiling to it.

The next aspect that it is important to take into consideration is the globes that you choose for your chandelier. To ensure that your dining room is not illuminated like a Christmas tree, you should decrease the wattage of the globes according to the number of globes that you require. For example, if your chandelier has three or four sockets, you should be using globes that are around 40 watts.

And, finally, how easy your chandelier is to clean should be the final aspect taken into account when choosing one for your dining room. Extravagant crystal fixtures can be quite problematic when it comes to cleaning so, unless you have a spare day every 6 months or so, this is not going to be a good choice for you. For those who are time poor, a chandelier that only needs a quick dust or wipe down with a damp cloth every now and then is going to be perfect.

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Choosing the Right Replacement Light Bulb for Your Needs

When planning a new lighting layout for your home, it is important to take many different factors into account. Besides simply how bright you want the area to be lit, a savvy homeowner must include other factors such as indoor/outdoor lighting, lumens, wattage, and even environmental impact to choose the correct methods and techniques for your lighting design.

When it comes down to it, it's all about the bulbs. The bulbs that you choose for your lighting design will have an immense impact on the sustainability and effectiveness of your lighting. There are three major types of replacement light bulbs; incandescent, fluorescent, and LED. The following is a quick rundown of how each bulb type can be utilized to light your home.

Incandescent Incandescent bulbs are what many people think of when they imagine a basic, residential indoor lighting bulb. The light is generated from heating a filament wire to high temperatures. Typically, incandescent bulbs last fairly long, but the problem with them is that they are costly in the long run. Incandescent bulbs require around 60 watts of electricity to produce light, making it exceptionally expensive when stretched over time. This is far more than any of the other modern options, although an incandescent bulb contains no mercury and is RoHS compliant.

Finally, the biggest downside to an incandescent replacement light bulb is its carbon footprint. Incandescent bulbs typically release around 150 pounds of CO2 into the atmosphere each year, far more than any other bulb allows.

Fluorescent A compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) is a great replacement light bulb to phase out incandescent. Typically of a similar (or even cheaper) price, CFLs are great for lighting systems that need to save cost without a heavy investment. CFLs use about a quarter of the energy consumed by an incandescent bulb in the long run, and are just as bright for about a third of the cost.

This is not without some hazards however. CFLs contain mercury, which is hazardous to the environment. Though CFLs emit far less carbon dioxide each year compared to incandescent, they must be disposed of responsibly through a special program. Also, CFLs are more sensitive to temperature and weather conditions. They become a heat and fire hazard if in extreme temperatures for too long; so keep that in mind when considering outdoor lighting or landscape lighting use.

LED Light-emitting diodes (LED) are special bulbs that use a cluster of smaller LED chips to emit waves and color characteristics. LED lighting beats out the competition in just about every sense. They are highly durable, require a tenth of the wattage that incandescent bulbs need, and emit almost zero btu's of heat while they work. LED lights are environmentally sound, contain no mercury or other harmful materials, and release only about 15 pounds of CO2 a year.

The only downside of LED lights is that they are expensive at first. LED replacement lights involve a considerable investment that essentially updates your entire lighting system. Once the installations are implemented, however, price drops to costing fractions of what other lighting systems cost in energy usage, per year.

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Choosing Outdoor Lights For The Decoration Of Your Home

There are many reasons that lead homeowners to want to decorate the outside of their homes with outdoor lights, including a celebration (such as a birthday), a holiday (such as Christmas), or the family's love of entertaining. By choosing some attractive and appropriate lights for installation somewhere outside your home, you could really make a statement that your visitors will be talking about when they leave.

The decorative outdoor lights that you ultimately choose will fall into one of four categories:

Traditional - These lights require the least amount of effort, as they can be put up whenever you want to use them and taken down when you don't plan on entertaining. Often, homeowners choose to use their old Christmas lights (which includes globes, mini fixtures and icicles), as they add a certain festive flair to any outdoor space. LED - Many homeowners like LED outdoor lights because they are almost as effortless as the traditional kind. They are also much smaller than other types of fixtures (meaning that they blend into the landscape very well) and they don't produce very much heat (meaning that they are safe and have a lower risk of fire). Specialty - Lights that are considered 'specialty' are ones that add a unique perspective to the outside of your home and make their own decorative statement. Some of these fixtures include net lighting (which are thrown over a bush or tree), teardrops (which are often hung from the eaves of your home), and even shaped lighting. Other - These sorts of outdoor lights are often known as lawn art, and they are fast growing in popularity around the world. They are available in a number of shapes (such as animals) and are simply laid out on your grass in your desired location. A timer can even control the way that the globes turn on, making them appear as if they're moving.

When it comes to choosing which outdoor lights you would like to install on the outside of your home, it is important that you carefully consider the fixtures in each of the above categories. Do you want lights that you can put up and take down as you wish, or ones that can be left on for extended periods of time without posing a safety risk? Do you want some interesting fixtures that illuminate certain areas of your yard, or ones that you can lay out on the grass?

Murano Glass Lighting, A Perfect Way To Enhance Your Rooms   Can You Use Energy Saving Lighting Outside?   Buying LED Tape - Some Advice   Choosing the Perfect Light Fixture for Your Victorian-Style Bedroom