Ceiling light design ideas for your house

Sometimes, false ceilings hide thermal insulation and AC ducting underneath the real ceiling behind them and present the functional ceiling of the room minus the mitigated heat from the roof. However, in both cases, it also offers umpteen lighting designs in its niches and decorations, adding a new dimension to the room decor.

This article will give a holistic account of how to choose false ceiling lights, and most of the contemporary lighting design concepts applied to false ceilings. Such lights are supported from a false ceiling and enhance the ambience of the room concerned by their thoughtful location.  

 

Modern false ceiling light design ideas

False ceiling design with hanging lights

Placing suspended lights into a lowered gypsum or POP false ceiling can serve as focal points, uplifting the overall ambience of the room.

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False ceiling design with track light

Track lights are an excellent option to illuminate your living spaces as they come in variety of styles, sizes and finishes. Highlight an artwork in your living room with this lighting option.

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False ceiling design for showroom

Showrooms need bright lighting to create a welcoming atmosphere. You may go for dropped ceilings with recessed spotlights, track lights or linear LED fixtures or a combination of different lighting options to highlight your product displays.

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A false ceiling light is decorative

False ceiling lights come under the category of Decorative Lights. Their primary purpose is to add an artistic effect to the room, lighting over and above the purpose of illumination. How to choose false ceiling lights is also an active consideration in the interior design of a room.

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Multiple settings for placing a false ceiling light

False ceiling lights are classified under the following categories depending on their intended purpose.

 

Ambient lighting 

Ambient lighting, known as general lighting, provides overall room illumination and is designed to create a consistent light level across the space, irrespective of any special lighting required in specific locations. Some of the convincing examples of ambient lighting are:

 

Ceiling-mounted or recessed fixtures that focus light downwards;

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Wall sconces or floor-lamp torchieres that shower the walls with light; 

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Cove and valence lighting that bounces beautiful light off ceilings and walls. 

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If you wonder how to choose false ceiling lights, maybe you can start with the ambient lighting requirements within your residential premises. That will do the trick and make you clearly understand how to choose false ceiling lights.

 

Task Lighting

Such lighting intends to facilitate specific tasks like reading, cooking, sewing etc., by making small objects or objects with low contrast more visible to the eyes.

Take these examples: While cooking, you need to see what’s cooking or items kept on the countertop. That’s how task lighting functions in a kitchen. Similarly, people read magazines in a waiting lounge or a drawing space. So task lighting there has to facilitate such activity. Other examples are lighting for an office desk, a writing table or, say, a table-mounted old model sewing machine that didn’t come with in-built LED lights for task lighting.

Task lighting can be managed by local illumination, reducing the distance of the light source from the surfaces on which the tasks are being executed. However, using false ceilings to achieve Task Lighting needs careful planning of lighting sufficient lumens of the fixtures used and reflectors, if any, taking care of the focussing angles.

Source: Pinterest

Source: Pinterest

See also: Check out these POP false ceiling design for lobby ideas

 

Accent lighting

Accent lighting is intended to add a dramatic effect and enhance the brightness of illumination. Examples include museum lighting for art, artefacts, shop lighting for jewellery, etc.

Accent lighting, often known as spotlighting, emphasises a specific object such as artwork, sculpture, bookcase, plant pots, etc. Outdoors, accent lighting is frequently utilised to draw attention to a particular landscape section or showcase a stunning tree, plant, or water feature. 

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Source: Pinterest

Accent lighting is frequently used with recessed or track lighting that has adjustable fittings, allowing light to be focused precisely, even on small objects. 

When planning about the different light levels in a room, it’s usually best to start with the ambient lighting and then go on to the task and accent lighting.

 

Classes of Fixtures for false ceiling light

An overwhelming gamut of fixtures in the market has, on the one hand, made the design ultimate flexible but, at the same time bit confusing how to choose false ceiling lights that will exactly emulate the mood of the room as conceived in the overall interior planning.

 

Chandeliers

A chandelier is a suspended false ceiling light that directs light upward, usually over a table. They can improve a room’s decorative style. Chandeliers provide ambient lighting.

 

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They can be gorgeous and heavy and minimalistic when need be. The weight of a chandelier can be as high as 200 kg depending upon the illumination needed out of it, the complexity of design and the final height of its bottom from the floor. 

Tall foyers and formal living and dining rooms may all have chandeliers in them that can be pretty large and heavy.

 

Foyer lights

These are decorative lights hung from the false ceiling at the foyer that make entry and passage to stairs safe.

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Different forms of hung cluster lights, including chandeliers, are used as Foyer Lights. 

 

Pendants

A pendant lamp, also known as a Drop light or a Suspender light, is a single light fixture hanging from a ceiling by a string, chain, or metal rod. Pendant lights are frequently used in groups, hung straight over kitchen countertops and dining tables, and occasionally in bathrooms.

They come in the following types.

 

Shade Pendants

Shaded pendants are those lights that sport copper, brass, porcelain, rattan or wooden shades over the light source. They can direct light downward only.

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Linear Pendant 

Linear pendants are characterised by tubular lights housed in long, singular canopies. These are great for hanging above kitchen islands, big dinner tables, hanging above a bar, and even lighting up café seating spaces.

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Glass Pendants  

The light housing is constructed entirely from glass when it comes to glass pendants. They can evenly distribute and diffuse light in your room. Glass pendants come in various finishes, including clear and opal, ripple and crosshatch light shade patterns, and can be used in any room.

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Multi Light Pendants 

Multi Light pendants again come in two types.

 The Vault Multi Light (Shadeless) 

Multiple light sources are mounted on arms connected to a central core in the first type of design. However, the Warehouse Industrial Light is a dim light attached to an armbar. They’re ideal for lighting huge areas, such as a pub or a master bedroom.

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Pendant string lights (with or without shades) 

These are attached to a ceiling rose and are the second type of multi-light pendant. With up to three, five, or nine light droplets, they can be suspended from circular ceiling roses.

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Source: Pinterest

 

Drum Shade Pendants 

Drum shade pendants have cylindrical drum-shaped shades generally made of fabric. These usually find usage in dining, master bedroom or living room.

 

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Globe Pendant Lights

As the name signifies, these lights are characterised by globe-shaped spherical glass housings that look like light balls. They add a classic look to the kitchen cafe or fall in line in a hallway.

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Cord Pendants

Cord pendants are the most minimalistic designs for showcasing designer bulbs and accentuating your interiors.

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Lantern Pendants

This is the epitome of vintage pendant false ceiling light with an unmatched classic touch.

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Recessed lights

Recessed lights, sometimes called downlights, are lighting fixtures built into the ceiling or wall. For a sleek and polished appearance, they are meant to sit flush with the surface of the false ceiling. 

They can be Canned or housed in a metal canister hidden inside the ceiling or Canless, which is ultra-thin, compact, mainly utilising LED lights, and fit in tight spaces for their form factor.

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Source: Pinterest

They often need to be used in multitudes to offset their short lighting distances. Must have good insulation to prevent moisture entrapment.

They find usage equally in bedrooms, over kitchen countertops and island bars. Utilised best while used alongside pendants and wall lights.

 

Cove lights

They are hidden lights that can dramatically affect a room, highlighting and outlining the island and shelf features of a decorative false ceiling design.

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They are a form of diffused, indirect lighting that mostly utilises LED light strips that offer a fully customisable layout and low energy consumption on use. The following factors help you to narrow down on your choices. 

 

Ambience

It decides how to choose false ceiling lights because the false ceiling with cove lights provides cosiness. They are not appropriate for offices or conferences. The false ceiling with cove lights, on the other hand, will add to the elegance of the false ceilings for offices if other decorative lights such as chandeliers or recessed lights are used.

 

Warmth

Fluorescent false ceiling cove lights are warmer and harsher than other false ceiling cove lights.

 

Energy-efficiency 

LED light designs are preferred for their maximum energy-saving capacities. 

 

Track lights

These lights are mounted generally on a rectilinear rail on the ceiling to highlight a particular portion of the wall beneath it. Find its usage in illuminating a wall hanging painting or a shelf-mounted curio etc.

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Utility lights

Utility lighting significantly impacts the ambience and functionality of spaces. Utility lighting is highly beneficial in areas dedicated to utility needs, such as laundry rooms, garages, stockrooms, or warehouses, and is very useful in both residential and commercial environments.

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They can either be flush with the false ceiling surface or hang close to that in separate housing.

 

Backlit ceiling panels

The backlit false ceiling light has become increasingly popular in Indian homes and companies. The backlights in these panels accentuate the fake ceiling designs, as the name implies. As a result, placing LED lights in false ceilings provides the needed efficiency. 

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They may have floral and other patterns that present a soothing look when backlit. 

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Rail lights

A form of evolved Track lights that can go beyond a rectilinear track can accommodate bends and even be curved.

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LED light panels

They offer fantastic task lighting in study rooms and offices, generally of rectangular thing housing having an array of LED bulbs of required luminous intensity for the task intended.

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Source: Pinterest

 

FAQs

Mention how to choose false ceiling lights without the following pitfalls

Not considering where the shadow is cast for a particular light fitting Choosing the wrong size of the fitting for the application Improper location of the light - both too high and too low location of a chandelier can mar the overall effect and efficacy. Without choosing the optimal wattage

How to choose false ceiling lights for bedrooms?

Dramatic effects can be achieved in bedrooms by using cove lights, track lights and spotlights alike by their thoughtful use.

Got any questions or point of view on our article? We would love to hear from you. Write to our Editor-in-Chief Jhumur Ghosh at [email protected]