3 Great Interior Design Ideas Using Wall Lights

Lighting can make or break a room. It’s essential when it comes to adding ambiance and atmosphere to a space, drawing attention to attractive design features like artwork and brightening up dimly-lit corners.

Not only that, but attractive, well-balanced wall lighting can control the warmth and coolness of your room, determining whether it’ll feel more cozy or clinical. Wall lights are also functional, as well as stylish. Task lighting in the bedroom allows you to read late at night, while wall fixtures in the bathroom can provide aesthetically-pleasing illumination for grooming and applying makeup.

There are many different options when it comes to wall lighting. It can be overwhelming at first, which is why we’ve put together 3 of our favorite wall light ideas to make things easier for you.

Table of Contents

1. Use Wall Lights to Illuminate Corners or Alcoves

Rarely is a single lighting fixture bright enough to illuminate all areas of a room. Yet oftentimes, homeowners implement only one overhead light in the center of their ceiling and expect it to cover all areas. While such lighting schemes may provide some general lighting, if you’re looking to make your interior design stand out, wall lights can are crucial.

Often, corners and alcoves of a room that central fixtures fail to reach are left dimly lit, detracting from the overall aesthetic of the rest of your room. Even a dazzling central chandelier will look pretty average if there are other areas of the room that are dark and subdued.

Wall lighting fixtures provide a perfect solution. Taking up little space whilst providing an impressive amount of supplemental illumination, they can be added to darker areas of the home to brighten them up and balance lighting from other fixtures, ensuring that all zones are covered.

2. Adding Warmth During Cooler Months

We’ve all experienced the winter blues. When the nights begin to draw in and the temperature drops, it’s easy to feel miserable and fed up, longing for summer to roll around. Adding warm wall fixtures to your home can help to bring comfort and depth in the cooler months, as well as providing supplemental illumination and stylistic depth during summer nights.

Lighting has been shown to have a significant impact on mood and emotion. Sure, we’ve all heard of the effects lighting can have on our eyes – straining to read books in the dark, we know, can put unnecessary strain on the eye and cause health problems.

Lesser known, however, are the impacts that different types of lighting can have on the way we feel emotionally. There are many known ways in which light has been shown to have an impact on physical and mental health. Insufficient lighting has even been shown to play a part in mood disorders, perhaps due to its role in vitamin D production. Proper lighting, on the other hand, can improve our wellbeing and energy levels.

Lighting in the office may also have an impact on productivity and focus, according to some studies. Cooler lighting has been shown to make people more productive and alert, allowing them to remain focused for extended periods of time.

Furthermore, lighting has even been shown to have an impact on appetite. Participants in a study were observed eating more slowly and less food when in a room with brighter lights, whilst others ate more and more quickly in dimmer spaces – something to keep in mind when incorporating wall lights in kitchen and dining areas.

If you’re planning on adding wall lights to bedrooms, you should also be mindful of their temperature. Warmer lights with lower Kelvin-ratings interfere less with sleep cycles than their cooler, more clinical counterparts. The latter may be better suited to task lighting, where brighter, more-focused light is preferable. Planning wall lights in the bathroom is similar as you should be mindful of Kelvin ratings and ensuring they are a minimum of IP44 rated.

3. Adding Depth and Finesse

Whether in a traditional or contemporary interior, wall lights are a sure way to add depth and finesse to any room. From minimalist sconces to elegant tiffany fixtures, wall lights provide an extra layer in lighting schemes, illuminating areas that central lighting might not reach.

It’s easy to implement just one or two standard overhead fixtures in a room, but these rarely stand out. Any professional interior designer understands the importance of layering lights, incorporating elements at different height-levels, like table lamps, ceiling lights and, of course, wall fixtures.

Wall lights can provide the perfect finishing touch in interior design, adding depth and finesse without compromising simplicity.

Author Profile

Adam Malvern

Adam is an in-house technical writer for Scotlight Direct, a website dedicated to providing the latest and most accurate information on lighting topics. With a passion for writing and a deep understanding of various lighting concepts and designs. Adam has been a valuable asset to the team since joining in 2019.