I was amazed at how ridiculously dark my 1955 ranch was when I purchased it. The bedrooms and even the kitchen had this pathetic 9x9 recessed light that held a 60 Watt bulb. No ceiling fixture at all in the living room. All the fixtures had charred wires from people using bigger bulbs.
I replaced them all with surface mount double 75W fixtures. Found some big enough to hide the old hole. I did put in a piece of sheetrock, but didn’t mess with taping or mudding.
I have two surface mount, 4ft double tube fluorescent fixtures in the kitchen. One over the sink and the other over the island. I had a Hunter ceiling fan/light put in the living room. Holds 4 bulbs, but I use 40W in that.
I’ve had some people comment that the kitchen seems too bright. But I like bright happy rooms. Except my bedroom late at night. I read by a lamp with a 60 W bulb. The shadows in the room are peaceful and I relax before sleeping.
I’m not sure if you intended to address purely artificial lighting, or lighting as a whole.
Generally speaking, I prefer to have a room flooded with sunlight as much as possible. This conflicts with my sense of privacy, unfortunately, as I live pretty close to neighbors who can see into the unit with the blinds open, so I go for a compromise. I try to use artificial lighting as little as possible until it becomes necessary due to time of day.
However, once it becomes necessary, I prefer the room to be pretty bright with overhead lighting in all areas of the house except the bedroom. In the bedroom, we have a much gentler lamp that we use at night that is enough light for the whole room for reading or any other purpose, but is about half as bright as the overhead lighting that is built in.
At work, I prefer brightly lit. I build things, and need the shop to be bright so as not to be dangerous.
At home, the only time I turn on an overhead light is when I’m looking for something in the freezer. I prefer dimly lit. Under cabinet lights in the kitchen, a table lamp in the living room.
Well I need a variety of lighting. In general for most rooms I prefer, warm, low lights. But over the food preparation areas in the kitchen, the workbench in the garage, desks, etc. I want bright lights so I can see clearly what I’m doing. The result is I’ve got a variety of lamps and overheads in all rooms so I can adjust the light to suit the needs of the situation. In my small office/computer room, for instance, I have a recessed ceiling light, a floor lamp with a three-way bulb, a 40-watt desk desk lamp and a halogen desk lamp.
My eyes aren’t what they used to be. I can’t seem to get enough light in this place. Seems I’m stuck with ‘dimly lit’ unless I get new lamps that accommodate a higher wattage bulb.
I like bright, warm lighting, so I use a lot of lamps. I have them on timers though, so the house gets progressively darker automatically as bedtime approaches. Usually, the only light source left by the end of the night is my computer screen and/or the TV.
You can’t just use compact fluorescent? Just 1/3 the wattage for the same light.
As we age our eyes become less flexible and the pupil won’t expand as much, so we don’t do as well in dim light. And even when we have enough light to see, more light will let the pupil get smaller and provide better depth of field (just like a camera lens). More depth of field just makes looking at things–and reading-- less of a hassle.
As for the poll, I can watch TV or surf the web in low light, but don’t want to do either activity in a completely unlit room. The rest of the time I’m reading or building/creating/repairing things, and for those activities my philosophy is that I should do them in better light than the results will be observed in. If I’m building a bookshelf I don’t want unexpected flaws to show up if sunlight shines on it through a window.
Kitchen and bathroom are pretty bright. While I have overheads in the bedroom and living room, I don’t use them unless I’m doing something like cleaning at night or a project. Otherwise, I use a side table lamp in those rooms, and I have an extra floor lamp in the living room that I still prefer over the ceiling light if I have company over or something. Even in the kitchen, I tend not to turn on the overhead light if I’m not cooking and just use the one over the sink.
During the day, I get lots of bright sunlight and don’t need any artificial light at all.
I hate bright light. I have never driven in my life without either headlights or sunglasses. Sometimes both at once. And in florescent-lighted rooms that ALSO have bright light shining in the windows I just want to die.
My mean little light-loving brown child (I’m very fair-skinned) calls me a vampire.
Kitchens and bathrooms should be mostly bright. Rooms such as bedrooms and living rooms are really activity dependent. Watching TV or a movie in dim or no light is okay. Playing the Wii or a boardgame seems best in bright light. Reading a book by lamplight seems best.
I will admit to typically preferring somewhat dim light overall, though. I think the fact that where I work is necessarily bathed in light probably pays a part in this.
I wanted to get a house built someday. I had considered hiring a lighting designer. I can understand the advantages of lighting a space with multiple task lighting instead of a large ceiling light.
Never built the house. I’m at an age now where taking on a big mortgage isn’t attractive. Took me 16 years to pay off my current homes mortgage and that feels good in this economy.
I’m from Spain: during a lot of the year, the sun is “that thing you hide from”. I like rooms that can receive a lot of natural light, but I think that light must be graduated depending on what you’re doing and that often a room has too much useless light: for example, a room the sun is shining into but where the fluorescents are on because most of the people who work there can’t think of switching them off. Don’t get me started on having the curtains drawn to keep the sun out and the lighting on at max power…
The wife and I argue about this all the time. We have a ceiling fan full of bright lights in the LR, with three dim lamps around the room. I prefer the lamps, she prefers the overhead bright light. Obviously I like good lighting while I read, but if I’m just hanging out with the family in the LR, I like a more muted light.
Depends on the time of day. I try to keep myself synced up with whatever natural sunlight there is. During the day? Bright lights, lots of windows open. At night, however, I prefer to turn off the bright overhead lights, and instead use a couple dim table lamps. If I mess with my circadian rhythm, Bad Things ensue. During a few particularly dark winters I’ve ended up in hibernating vampire mode – only awake from mid afternoon 'til late night.