Lighting is my favorite way to change the mood in a room. Unlike fabrics, furniture, plants, and anything else that you have to actually carry into a space and arrange, lighting can always be there ready for you to turn it on. While dimmers and programmable lighting seems to be gaining popularity, I’ve noticed that one underused way to light a home interior is with LED backlighting.
Image from FurnitureFashion.com
Designer Tip: Backlighting a mirror creates drama in the bath and it also can serve up a mood changer for evening baths. And, even serve as a stylish way to light it as a night light.
Backlighting is what it sounds like: it’s lighting that illuminates objects from behind. When you light from behind-- a mirror, bed, artwork or TV---the object looks like it’s glowing. It’s lighting for big drama and a cool-feeling. And backlighting is a sneaky way that easily helps create modern mood lighting without having to spend a ton of money, or time, to make it happen.
If you are new to backlighting, there are a few basics you’ll want to know about before filling up your shopping cart.
1. Which objects to backlight?
Selective backlighting involves planning. Backlighting doesn’t mean that you have to outline everything in the room. It can look a little ‘Star Trek’ if you outline every picture, shelf, etc., in a room. And it can get a little visually frenetic. Your eyes will be in lighting overload and it will look more like a kid’s party place at the local bouncy-bowling-party place than your slick living room. Focus on the TV or the mantel or that treasured wall art you created with your family.
Image: LampsPlus.com
Backlighting a TV with tape lighting can be a fun way to add a modern the feel to your media room .
2. What kind of light?
So, most of us immediately jump to LED tape lights as the ideal way to ‘outline’ an object, it doesn’t mean that they are the only product you can use.Try it out and see if you like the look because LED tape lights offers the most consistent glow along the entire length.
This indoor-outdoor LED rope light uses just 8 watts of power and can be connected to create longer lengths.
Image: LampsPlus.com
Backlighting a mirror can be a perfect way to have a stylish night light in the bathroom.
3. How bright is the light?
Like anything in home design, it always settles on what you love. If you want a super-modern bright space-ship feel for your bedroom, you’ll want to have a cool light that’s super bright.
Brightness is measured in lumens. The higher the lumens, the brighter the light. If you want a your LED backlighting to be comparable to a 60-watt incandescent, go for an 800 lumen light.
One of the best features of backlighting is that if you use lighting that’s battery operated or plug-ins, it will be easy to experiment and change the mood depending on the season and the reason.
Image: Fanelis
The warm wood becomes super modern with backlighting with underlighting techniques.
In any space you want to make sure you cover the lighting basics: ambient, task and accent. In the bedroom above, ambient or overall lighting , task lighting is achieved with the table lamps and the underlighting serves as accent lighting drawing your eyes to the bed details as well as the backlighting in the alcove.
Which of these LED backlighting techniques can you use in your home? Leave me a comment below.
For more ways to incorporate LED into your home take a read through Kitchen Design With LED Tape Lights and LED Lighting: Debunking the Myths.