LIGHTING FOR INTERIOR CEILINGS

When it comes to lighting your home from the ceiling, you can choose styles ranging from chandeliers to recessed lighting, track lighting, fluorescent bars and more. Each style has its own way of lighting a room, so you'll want to choose the fixture based on a mixture of functionality and design, depending on the room.

Chandeliers

Chandeliers provide a large, central fixture. They commonly appear in entryways, but you may find them in dining rooms, bedrooms or any area where there is a wide-open space and sufficient ceiling height to allow for the chandelier to be hung and still provide clearance for individuals walking through. One way to tie in chandeliers with the overall design of the home is to use them in conjunction with centralized floor patterns, such as a hardwood floor inset in the middle of a living room or a natural stone tile medallion set in the center of an entryway.

Track Lighting

Track lighting can be on stable tracks, hung from flexible cables, be straight or spiraled, have open bulbs or be encased. One way to use track lighting is above a stand-alone bar, such as in the kitchen or a finished basement, with the lighting focusing directly downward onto the surface. The earliest versions of track lighting were straight tracks, but modern variants can include complex patterns and lights that are set at different heights. Many track lighting systems are fully adjustable so you can point the lights in the direction you desire.

Ceiling Fan Combo

A ceiling fan and light combination is more useful in bedrooms and small areas as opposed to wide-open spaces. Ceiling fans often are mounted in a centralized location, and if you are working with a single unit, you are limited by however many light fixtures that particular ceiling fan has. However, multi-fixture units are available that disperse more light. In addition, if you are working in a larger, more open space and have the room to mount more than one ceiling fan, you can generate more light than just a single unit. On top of the light provided, you have the dual-purpose benefit of air circulation, which can help circulate cold or warm air depending on the direction of the fan blades, helping you be warmer or cooler.

Recessed Lighting

Recessed lighting is more for design purposes than for actually lighting an entire room. Because human beings perceive light based upon vertical surfaces more than horizontal, recessed lighting -- also known as can lighting -- does not always provide the most illumination. However, it is ideal for areas where the light specifically shines down onto a surface, such as a desk, shower or bar top. Recessed lights do little toward providing lighting for an entire room, but they create a certain visual appeal that may help define a space within a room while a chandelier or drop-down light fixture provides illumination for the rest of the room.

WHY INTERIOR DESIGN IS VERY ESSENTIAL WHEN SELLING YOUR HOME

The decision to list your home for resale is a big one. No doubt it came about after much thought, weighing pros and cons, and series of long discussions. However, once you decide to put your home on the market, get ready for the next big discussion: interior design.
Many times sellers assume that interior design is a waste. If you are look to get as much money as possible out of your home, why would you put money back into it just to make look prettier for the new owners?
While this line of thinking seems reasonable at first, listing a home without at least tweaking the interior design can seriously harm your chances of finding a buyer and lower your final profit. Read on to find out why interior design is essential when listing your home.

Interior Design Generates Traffic

The first step toward putting any home up for sale is marketing it. When potential buyers look for a home, they are sent listings via email. Each property listing includes a short bio of the home, figures about how many bedrooms/bathrooms/square feet, etc, and some photos. Based on this information, the buyers decide which homes they would like to see.
Since buyers often look at multiple listings at once, it’s critical that you make your property stand out in the crowd – and that’s where interior design comes into play.
There are often lots of homes with similar in terms of square footage and number of bedrooms, so the choice to view one home over another comes down to the photos. Given the choice of two like properties, would choose the one that has newer appliances and a cohesive design or the one that looks like it hasn’t been updated in over a decade?
At the end of the day, interior design helps bring traffic to your property. The greater the number of people that view your home, the more likely it is that someone will submit an offer to purchase. Why not use interior design to give you that extra edge? 

Interior Design Defines Purpose

After all the years spent living in your home, you undoubtedly have a pretty solid idea of how to use the space. For instance, you may know that your kitchen table will comfortably seat four, but for anything bigger you need to use the dining room. Or, that your spare bedroom is the perfect spot for a home office.
Potential buyers want you to share that knowledge. When they look at a home during a showing, they are looking for visual clues on how to use the space most effectively. If they aren’t clues, that confusion can cause them to look toward another property. Use interior design to make sure they get a clear picture.
When working on your interior design for resale. Make sure to give every room a specific purpose. Leave only the furniture, appliances, and accessories needed to communicate that purpose in the room and get rid of any clutter.

Interior Design Adds a Fresh Approach

Yes, since your home has been previously owned, potential buyers should walk in expecting to see a certain amount of wear and tear. If they are opposed to that, they should be looking exclusively at new construction. That said, taking the time to spruce things up may generate more offers.
Think about if you were to buy a used car. Before you drive it off the lot, you’d expect the dealership to have washed and buffed the exterior, vacuumed out the inside, and even taken the time to spray some of that infamous “new car smell”. And, rightly so. You wouldn’t want to purchase a car that was full of someone else’s food crumbs and muddy footprints, would you?
Revamping the interior design in your home works in much the same way. Though you are still leaving the bones of the house intact, a new coat of paint or some fresh carpeting will leave the home feeling fresh and new, which will leave buyers feeling better about the final product they’ll receive for the (considerably large) amount of money they’re about to spend. That comfort level could generate more offers.

Interior Design Adds Value

There’s no dying that selling a house is about money. As a seller, it’s only natural that you would want the biggest return possible on your home’s resale. Believe it or not, putting some money into interior design now can help you get a bigger purchase price later.
When a real estate agent determines the correct list price for your home, he or she looks at the features that your home has to offer and then compares those features to similar homes that are currently on the market or have been sold recently. Some of these features include: location, square footage, and interior design.
There’s nothing you can do to improve the first two factors. If your lot is near a major road it will always sell for less than a similar property in a quiet neighborhood. Same for a property with tiny rooms compared to a home with spacious ones. But, the interior design is well within your control.
Factors such as kitchen upgrades, bathroom remodels, and whether or not you have a finished basement are taken into account when deciding to list one property higher than another. They are also a consideration when the buyers decide how much to offer. Sloppy design is more likely to generate a low-ball offer than one where pulled together interior lends credence to value
The right interior design investment now may pay off big later.

It’s easy to understand why the debate on whether to refresh your interior design for resale can be a fierce one. While it may seem silly to invest money into a property that you intend to sell, the benefits far outweigh the initial payout. With an increase of traffic, buyer appeal, and value, it’s easy to see why interior design is essential when listing your home. Use this as a springboard to help you get started.
What’s your favorite interior design tip? We’d love to know what helps influence your home.

WINDOW TREATMENT AND LIGHTING MAKE OVERS

While changing your window treatments and doing a lighting makeover may seem like two separate projects, they both focus on one of the most important elements of your interior decor: light. An important part of the ambiance you create in your home is the light you let in and allow to radiate out. While time must be spent choosing curtains and lamps, successful makeovers depend on choosing the quality of light you want to create.

Varieties of Interior Light

In planning both natural and artificial light, design professionals identify four categories of light: ambient, task, accent and decorative. Both ambient and task lighting can be strongly affected by the size and placement of windows and the curtains, shades or other decorative treatment you choose for them. Ambient light describes the overall atmosphere of a room; task lighting is related to how well you can see what you want to do in a specific room. Some portion of both ambient and task lighting is natural light. Accent and decorative lighting are primarily created by lighting fixtures, are chosen on the basis of how they highlight and reinforce the decorative scheme of the space.

Ambient Light

To create a comfortable ambiance, examine your window-treatment choices in both natural and artificial light -- that is, both day and night. While some decorators may favor dramatic differences between daytime and nighttime looks in a room, lush dark drapes can look overly formal in a den during the day, while frilly, light-accommodating curtains can make a kitchen or bedroom look chilly at night. Natural light may itself cause problems, glaring in the living room during the afternoon or keeping north-facing bedrooms dim for most of the day. Ceiling fixtures may produce a downward glare or even cast shadows. Lamps alone may create pools of light bordered with darkness. One solution may be to add indirect lighting to your overall plan; window valances can perform a dual function. The goals of both window treatments and lighting choices for ambient light should be to produce consistent illumination at all times of day.

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Task Lighting

Anyone who has ever taken a needle to be threaded into the bathroom or the front hall is familiar with problems in task lighting. Task lighting makes it possible to see what you're doing, whatever that may be in any room. Usually, task-oriented window treatments let you control natural light easily; curtains can be parted, shades easily raised and shutters moved as needed. Washable, durable materials and sturdy hardware make it easy to use natural light for chores, then quickly restore the look of the window treatment. Artificial task lighting is all about focus. For counter-based tasks, under-cabinet fixtures bring light exactly where it is needed. Recessed or pendant lights illuminate just the area where you are working.

Accent and Decorative Lighting

Both accent and decorative lighting play important roles in pulling colors and stylistic elements of your decor scheme together. Use a turquoise-shaded pendant light to emphasize the blue in your paisley-print drapes. Echo the cream and muted red of your curtains with red-based table lamps. The echo resounds in both directions: back an ornately shaded Victorian lamp with ruffly sheer priscilla curtains to create an old-fashioned vignette in the upstairs hall.

Flexibility

While redoing window treatments or lighting arrangements involves making decisions, one of the secrets to long-lasting satisfaction is flexibility. Plantation shutters may be securely installed, but their louvers can be adjusted to let in more or less light as needed. A window rod with classic finials can accommodate a variety of scarves and swags as the seasons or other elements of your decor change. You can also make lighting choices both firm and flexible. Designers note that adding switches in different locations lets you get the most out of your lighting design because you can make more frequent adjustments and use lights in different configurations. Using different kinds of light bulbs and placing fixtures at different heights within a room offer you flexibility in lighting arrangements.

Green Choices

When doing a window-treatment makeover or redesigning lighting, keep energy efficiency clearly in mind. Fabrics that insulate or reduce sun damage save energy as well as expense. Innovations in light-bulb technology deliver more light for less money than was the case even a few years ago. Directly and indirectly, window treatments and lighting choices strategies make energy-use more efficient and effective in your home.

WHAT IS INTERIOR DECORATING ?

Although people often think interior decorating and interior designing are the same, they are not. Interior decorators choose the paint color for your wall, while interior designers will knock it down to alter the structure of the room. Interior decorating deals with the look and feel of a room by adding accessories like drapes and rugs; interior designers make the best use of the space.

Job Description

Interior decorating concentrates on the aesthetics of a space—how to pair an open floor plan with complementary furniture and decor accents, or create atmosphere or mood with lighting or wall sconces.

Responsibilities

Interior decorating “dresses” an existing space. It begins with a broad concept, such as postmodern, retro or traditional aesthetics, and works in the details of that style. An interior decorator typically stays with one design style from start to finish to create continuity in a space, and works with you on color selection, textures and patterns you prefer but that are consistent with the overall style concept. Redecorating a room or updating an outdated style falls under the heading of interior decorating, or use of the existing space; new construction blueprints and building permits are not in the interior decorator’s toolkit.

Style Selection

A decorator may decide to use refined art deco elements to emphasize the sophistication of your living room, or to go retro with uber-cool, shabby chic accents. He will provide samples of design features to help you choose. Interior decorating draws from varied styles and trends and brings them together to express your personal style.

Budget

You provide a budget, and a good decorator stays on course. She keeps you on budget and communicates with you before making purchases that could break your expense account. Along with having artistic flair, the savvy decorator should possess financial savvy—knowing to devote more money to, say, the antique hutch that will become the room's focal point and less on more inconspicuous decor.

Industry

The interior decorating industry dovetails well with residential projects: large commercial jobs rarely call on interior decorators to update a lobby or conference hall. An interior decorator usually helps a homeowner with a complete renovation, or a minor update like adding "green" elements to a room—bamboo or cork flooring, or recycled glass tiles—to freshen the look of an already well-decorated space.