Room guide
Living room lighting
A living room plan with a lumen target, four source positions, and one color temperature.
A lumen target, a color temperature and a layering plan for every room in an ordinary home or apartment.
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01
The same four questions, room by room
Every room guide on this site answers the same four questions in the same order, because the order is what makes it a plan rather than a shopping list.
- How much light does this room owe you? Floor area times the published footcandle range for that room's use.
- How much does it already produce? Read the lumen figure on the bulbs currently in it and add them up. This step alone resolves a lot of rooms.
- Where does the difference go? Split across three or four sources at different heights rather than concentrated in one.
- What color temperature, consistently? One value across the room, matched to what the room is for.
The arithmetic behind step one, including where it stops being accurate, is in how many lumens does a room need. The reasoning behind step three is in layered lighting explained.
02
The targets, in one table
| Room / task | Footcandles | 120 sq ft | 200 sq ft |
|---|---|---|---|
| Living room, ambient | 10 - 20 fc | 1,200 - 2,400 lm | 2,000 - 4,000 lm |
| Bedroom, ambient to task | 20 - 50 fc | 2,400 - 6,000 lm | 4,000 - 10,000 lm |
| Kitchen, general | 20 - 50 fc | 2,400 - 6,000 lm | 4,000 - 10,000 lm |
| Kitchen prep surface | 50 - 100 fc | Task area only | Task area only |
| Home office desk | 50 - 75 fc | Task area only | Task area only |
| Hallway and stairs | 5 - 10 fc | 600 - 1,200 lm | 1,000 - 2,000 lm |
Two rows are marked task area only deliberately. You do not light a whole kitchen to 100 footcandles - you light the room to the general figure and put a separate light on the counter. That distinction is the difference between a lighting plan and a very bright ceiling, and it is why under-cabinet lighting exists as a category.
The bedroom row surprises people, because it starts above the living-room range. It covers dressing and reading, which are demanding tasks. Applied to a whole bedroom it produces a room lit like a changing room - so light the room at the bottom of the range and put the extra where the task is.
03
Color temperature, by room
One value per room, matched to what happens there, and everything within a visual field kept inside about 500K of everything else.
- Living room and bedroom - 2700K. Used after dark, mostly for relaxing. The bedroom is the strongest case on the site for staying warm.
- Kitchen and bathroom - 3000K, and up to 4000K on a counter, which reads as its own zone.
- Home office - 3500K to 4000K during working hours. The best case in a home for a tunable bulb: cool while working, warm afterwards, one socket.
- Hallways - match the rooms either side. A hallway is seen from the rooms it connects, so it is a consistency problem rather than an optimization one.
The full chart, and the retailer naming that makes buying the right one unnecessarily confusing, is in the color temperature guide.
04
If a room has no ceiling fixture
Nothing above changes. The target is the same, the layers are the same, and the color temperature is the same - the ambient layer just comes from a torchiere aimed at the ceiling rather than from a fixture attached to it.
In practice, a room planned this way usually ends up better lit than one with an overhead light, because a single ceiling source produces glare in your eye line, hard shadows on faces and dark corners. That is why rooms that have one still need lamps. Starting from nothing means distributing the light correctly from the beginning.
The whole plan for that case, including how to find a switched outlet and which corner the uplight belongs in, is in lighting a room with no ceiling light.
Pages
Everything in Room-by-Room
Room guide
Bedroom lighting
A bedroom plan: two bedside sources, one dimmable ambient, everything at 2700K.
Room guide
Kitchen lighting
Two layers, two targets: general kitchen light and the much brighter counter, both achievable without wiring.
Room guide
Apartment lighting
A whole-apartment plan in buying order - nothing wired, nothing left behind.
FAQ
Questions people actually ask
+How many lumens does each room need?
Multiply the floor area in square feet by the published footcandle range for that room: 10 to 20 for a living room, 20 to 50 for a bedroom or general kitchen light, 50 to 100 on a kitchen prep surface, 5 to 10 for hallways. A 120 square foot living room lands at 1,200 to 2,400 lumens.
+Should every room be the same color temperature?
Within a room, yes - keep everything inside about 500K. Across a house you can vary: 2700K in living rooms and bedrooms, 3000K on kitchen and bathroom surfaces, 3500K to 4000K on a desk during working hours.
+Which room is hardest to light without a ceiling fixture?
A kitchen, because there is rarely floor space for a torchiere and the counter has the highest published target in the home. The workable answers are a bright under-cabinet run that spills into the room, a plug-in fixture on a spare wall, or a swag pendant over a table.
+Why does one room feel darker than another of the same size?
Surfaces. A room with white walls and ceiling returns a large share of the light that hits them; dark walls, dark floors and full bookcases absorb most of it. Add about 25 percent to your lumen target for a dark room.
+Do I need a different plan if I rent?
Not a different plan - the same plan, built from things that plug in. Every room guide here reaches its target with lamps, plug-in fixtures and adhesive-mounted bars, because that is what works whether or not the room has a ceiling fixture.
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