I have a lighting problem that I am hoping someone can help with. The room is in my home. There are no windows and the room is relatively dark. Most of the front of the room is open entrances to other rooms in the house that have windows. The problem is the back wall-no matter what lights I turn on, the room always seems (and in fact is) dark along that wall. Naturally that is where the desks fit best. So, my question is:
Does anyone have any ideas on how I can evenly light up a wall, 14 feet long by 8 feet high, with lighting that will be even and brighten the room? I certainly have power to the wall and ceiling and am not afraid to do whatever installation is required. Everyone I have talked to so far has recommended some variation of light cans in the ceiling pointed at the wall. That doesn’t appeal to me since those light always seem to make bright spots. Instead of a light area, I would have a couple of bright spots on the wall surrounded by relative darkness. Of course this is hard to explain, but think of a room with two walls equipped with large openings and two walls completely closed off. The contrast between the open areas and the dark corner is depressing.
Can anyone imagine a lighting system that will even illuminate a wall? Not bright in some parts and dark in others? Failing that, a lighting system that provides light from a window sized area?
Do you have another room above it? If not, a skylight or light tunnel would be my recommendation. We had a light tunnel installed in our front hall with remarkable effect.
One inexpensive consideration might be a row of strip fluorescent lighting surface mounted on the ceiling. You can buy single bulb 4’ units. Because you do not want the naked fixture to be visible, drop a 4" wooden curtain down in front of the row of fixtures. This will create a smooth indirect light against the wall. If the ceiling is reasonably lighted from the other direction you should not see a pronounced shadow from the curtain.
A second consideration might be to create a similar indirect lighting, but with the lighting mounted vertically on the side walls with the throw toward the wall and corner you want brightened up; again with a wood shield to hide the fixtures.
Note that with indirect lighting it does not have to be fluorescent, but that’s the easiest, in my opinion. Buy a temperature of bulb that is in the warmer range if you don’t like the coolness of ordinary fluorescent bulbs.
Lots of other options, of course…the one in the post above by Key Lime Guy is a good example. the general idea is to light the wall smoothly and let the wall indirectly light the rest of the area.
Continuing along the lines of Key Lime Guy’s suggestion, make some phone calls to lighting supply houses. Equipment manufacturers have extensive product literature which lighting design folks use to determine how many fixtures are needed, appropriate wattage, and placement. They can also show you many more options than we can describe on a message board. You give them room dimensions, wall/ceiling colors, and they can do a good job of advising you the first time, rather than figuring it out by SWAG.
Perhaps track lighting. Use fairly bright CFL flood lights and set it, I don’t know, 6 or 7 feet back maybe. Give it enough distance to spread out and I would imagine that might cover the wall.
Or you could use two portable dual halogen painters lights.
Thanks!
wallwashing is what I want. Now that I have a word for it, I can go shopping. I tried lighting fixture stores-since it isn’t in the average house they had no clue. I live in Katrinaland and those stores were pretty overwhelmed for a long time. It wasn’t like a city that was building 50,000 homes all at once with a few hundred experienced contractors-it was like a city (region) having 50,000 new housing contractors building one home each all at once.
I would consider a variation of Chief Pedant’s idea, but mount the fluorescent lights in a trough attached to the wall about 2’ below the ceiling with the lights directed up and reflecting off the ceiling. The trough could be lined with aluminum sheet to increase reflectivity.
Don’t know what your budget is, but I would go with track lighting rather than fluorescent. You can direct it where you want it, and quality of light is better with, say, halogen bulbs.
You don’t mention what color your wall are. If possible, try painting the problem walls a lighter shade of the same color. Even without lights on, it will seem lighter.