One Saturday evening, in the waning days of the year, I found myself in one of the most exquisitely lit rooms I’d ever been in. I was at a neighbour’s for dinner, and our hosts had paid specific attention to the ambient lighting in their house. We started in their thoughtfully considered living room, aglow with just the right amount of warmth. We chatted and sipped our drinks, everyone lit to flatter. When it came time to move to the adjacent dining room, our host casually adjusted the lighting to match. It was quite simply perfect.
It might seem like an odd detail to hold onto from a wholly charming, well-rounded evening, but anyone who’s found themselves in a poorly lit room knows that bad lighting — just like bad music or bad conversation — can nudge an evening in the wrong direction.
Yet bad lighting — or at least incorrect lighting that doesn’t align with circumstances — is abundant. I’ve spent many an evening feeling downright vampiric as I retreat from an undimmed pot light in favour of the more flattering shadows. I wanted to know why we struggle with lighting — and how we might easily improve.
To answer these questions and more, I reached out to Sheri Krug from Vivid Concepts lighting and design shop for her guidance on how to get light right.
“We all instinctively know when lighting is good or bad,” Krug told me. “Just not consciously.” Krug, who is trained as an environmental designer, has spent her career paying attention to details that shape how we experience a space. Lighting, she says, is a foundational part of that experience.
“Lighting has changed over the years. If you think about a ’50s bungalow, there were no overhead lights. We used a lot of table lights and floor lamps. And somewhere along the way, we adopted this perspective where more is better,” says Krug. In reality, she says, the most important thing is the ability to control your lighting and change it to suit your needs.
“If you’re building a puzzle with your child you want to have brighter light, but when the child goes to bed, you don’t want to sit and relax in a bright space.” The key, according to Krug, begins with understanding the different kinds of light available to you.