Home Decor: New Trends in Interior Lighting Design

It's a time-honored tradition to make a room appear completely transformed simply by making a few small changes, whether by applying new color paint, a bold rug, or some funky objets d'art. That also applies to changing the way a room is lit, whether with lamps, ceiling fixtures, area lighting, or sconces. In fact, changing your lighting scheme is an economical way to renew and dramatize your rooms, giving them a new vitality and soul-pleasing ambiance. Naturally, when choosing your new lighting, it makes good sense – stylistically and economically - to understand the new trends in lighting.

Choices of lighting will get bolder, so the fixture makes a definite statement about the homeowner. Recessed lighting has burned out it's been so overused. Designers cringe when they see it, so out it goes. While your at it, throw out your old track lighting. They're an obtrusive eyesore with exposed cables that make you at them instead of what they're illuminating. So what do you put in their place?

Hidden track lighting is the new way to go. Hidden hardware hide the cables and they operate on low-voltage, so they're environmentally too, which is also a new direction in home lighting. You'll be lighting two trends with one bulb.

Art Deco fixtures have been de rigueur forever, or so it seems, and it shows every sign of continuing on ad infinitum. And art deco is flexible, comfortable in every interior from Victorian to modern. It as visual interest, personality, and warmth. The good news is that a lot of it was made, so it's easy to find original deco in second-hand markets. Plus it's popular, so there's lots of deco style being produced today.

Eco friendly lights are mean and green. With the number of eco-minded homeowners on the rise, the market is rushing to meet their demands, and not just with the fixtures. Also green are the bulbs being used in them, but dimmer switches help keep energy use low, and automatic lighting control will turn the lights down for you.

Bigger lighting fixtures are now required for the larger rooms and living spaces now being designed into homes. Walls are being knocked out to provide an open layout, and the chandelier that used to work perfectly doesn't cut it in a room twice or three times the size. Look for lighting fixtures to amp it up and enlarge to fill bigger areas.

Japanese influenced lighting makes real headway on the American landscape. Just as Japanese influences crept into our furniture, and more recently our fabrics, look for it in lighting as well. How about a little Feng shui in your fixtures?

Multidimensional lighting is gaining more ground all the time, and this trend is going to continue. Homeowners are more educated about their lighting needs, and it's more than just a couple of lamps. Now we need lighting to function in several ways in the same room; task, ambient, decorative, and accent.

Now that your path is illuminated, remember that completely transforming a room can be as simple as following the new lighting trends.