Dear All,

I am exhausted with my research to find appropriate lighting ideas for my 3 bedroom apartment. I am tired of the clueless look the light shop owners/sales guys give me whenever I said, I do not have plaster ceiling and down lights. Some even said it is almost impossible to get decent and modern lighting for the apartment without having down lights as my main source of lighting.

This is my very first apartment and I have zero experience. My concern is whether lighting is sufficiently bright, no strobe/shadow from the ceiling fans, and optimum layout.

I have no idea what size of lighting fixture i should use.

I won't be using any wall lights.


Kitchen / Dining / Living

I have attached a photo of how the open plan of my apartment appears like. From the entrance, it goes kitchen --> dining --> and then --> Living. There is one fan unit between the living and dining.

I have also attached the individual pic of lights that I was considering for these 3 areas but not sure if I am on the right track.




However, having said that, I did take a chance and have bought a set of pendant lights for my dining though after careful thought of my budget - set of 3 crystal lights. I grabbed it at CIMA Lighting in PJ since it was the last display unit they had and wanted to clear it. Photo is attached.


The last photo is a collage of all individual pics including the overall of the area I am talking about.

Both kitchen and living lights were chosen from Seng Hup but due to some unpleasant experience (the sales people were extremely unprofessional) throughout my selection and ordering process, I am considering to cancel the order (but not finalised yet). And if I do cancel the order, I will have to carry out the whole exercise of selection process at a different store of which I would like to just duplicate my choices if am on the right track now. This current situation is what prompted me to post my questions here.

I do plan to have a floor lamp at the corner of my L-shaped sofa but I guess that would be the last item I would buy after all furniture are in.

I am now at lost in finding the appropriate lights with a minimalist & modern touch for kitchen and living that would complement with the pendant lights that I have bought. I have some ideas of what could possibly suit the rooms which I have listed below.


3 Rooms (2 bedroom) + 1 small room (what I call as Sanctuary room)

I planned to have mounted ceiling lights in all 3 rooms. Something like this : EGLO - Quarto 1
What are your thoughts?

Both bedroom will have at least one bed side table and a lampshade that will be placed on it.

The small room a.k.a sanctuary room is planned for a simple study table, meditation area and also will have a cross-trainer. You can perhaps see the functionality of this room.

The technical details of choosing the lights overwhelms me and I hope someone from this forum could guide me through.

Thanks in advance.

This post has been edited by Career26: Mar 8 2015, 12:01 PM

track lights dont need plaster ceiling and you can keep adding light fixture and place them wherever you want. but use led track light

you can also use surface mounted downlights but you need to pull wiring to add additional fixtures. unless you can tahan surface mounted wiring with some sort of trunking to conceal the wires

actually you can just put one or two decent size chandelier/ceiling light and that should be enough to brighten up say a living room. Then you just add additional table or floor lamps.

This post has been edited by idoblu: Mar 8 2015, 03:19 PM

Thanks idoblu.

Do you mind explaining a bit further - like which area is for track lights surface mounted dowlights, etc?

If you read my post, I have individual pic posted according to the area - kitchen, living and dining. It did look brighter at the time of selection in the store (not sure if it is due to other lights which remained turned on or so; but I am unable to visualise the brightness at my place if I go for these ones.

What do you think of my choices?

i got the same problem as TS. m not quite fond of plaster ceiling

Unless ur apartment come with sufficient lighting point on the ceiling or wall, u will either need to hack the wall for lighting , or go for plaster ceiling ...I'm not sure if ur apartment come with aircon and water heater point as well....

same for me as well , my is landed house , i dont really plan to put extra lighting at my ground floor but as for my 2nd floor where it come with plaster ceiling , hence i decide to put in dimlight on it.

although there are fan and light point at my living (2Light ,1Fan) , dining(1light 1fan) ,dry kitchen (1 light).

i wonder how can i utilize those existing and build a better lighting system instead of going to plaster ceiling ..

Hi Steven,

Thanks. No doubt on the points (I think your reply is directed to me unless you are asking the question to the other friend, noien.

As for my apartment, the developer has already provided me with all the dedicated light and fan points including air-cond and water heater. My thread refers to the complexity in choosing appropriate lighting since my reno work does not include plaster ceiling and installation of down lights. I know my post is lengthy but may be you will understand and provide me with your 2 cents after reading it once more.

Thanks.

Sorry just my opinion the lamp design look really old fashion too me

That's alright but if you could specify which one, that will be helpful. If you have read my thread fully, you would be able to understand that am having tough time finding the appropriate light options. Pics attached are something that I have surveyed and considered; not finalised yet.

Kitchen area should be bright, sufficient for cooking at night. Plus you do not need the fancy light for kitchen unless it's going to be a decorative kitchen showroom.

Have you also considered the cleaning & maintenence of those lights in the long run as well plus the overall wattage you require to brighten the area?

And there is also cool white and warm white types though.

if thats the case,u can have a look at ikea pendant light ...plenty of nice pendant light using e27 bulb ,which can provide sufficient brightness and looks modern .... u can consider track light,with 3-5spot light.

i would suggest u to get a stand lamp with at least 18w cool white and support by secondary lighting such as track spot light for a brighter living hall.

ikea got plenty of stand lamp ..ranging frm RM40 to RM 300+ ..Depend on the design .i have bought myself with a RM40 paper type stand lamp fitted with 20w LED bulb at living. ..quite bright imo.cool white. ...

This post has been edited by steventan85: Mar 9 2015, 09:14 AM

Cleaning of the crystal lamps will be tedious.

You can check out "Phillips" brand lighting fixture. More pricey but if you are not going for quantity you can probably consider. Google for you local distributor.

Meowy,

Thanks for your input. But, I have purchased the crystal lamps already.

Google image for track lighting and you can find a lot of nice track lighting design. Ikea also selling quite a lot of nice design track lighting.

some track design come with fixed amount of light but some track lighting you can add on the light and adjust the length

let me dig up some photos for reference first. Okay found some for your reference. 1st picture is warm white. The rest are cool white.

, , , ,

Wattage, usually in a light shop, they have display bulbs, lights and led lighting switched on for testing right? You can also see how bright the light is. And consider how many lights you want for kitchen first? For bulbs alone. The wattage is listed on the box alone. 5W, 6W, 8W etc. Go for E27 size. If there's a light testing station, you can ask the staff to test the light brightness for you.

Will 1 or 2 lights be sufficient for kitchen area? Next will be the the type of light, cool and warm white. Cool white is pure white light and Warm white is yellow light. I think for kitchen, Cool white will be good for visibility.


This post has been edited by S'aimer: Mar 9 2015, 01:17 PM

A picture that shows overall apartment light layout! As a reference

Thanks for the pic!

Thanks onnying88. I am not sure whether purchasing lights from Ikea will be a good idea. But I think it is good way to get started there before deciding where to purchase what. Did you purchase your lights at Ikea ?