Achieving a feeling of openness and an ambience that feels natural and more spacious is not simply a case of having a big enough room to achieve that aim, the trick is learning how to allow the right of natural light into the space.
There are various proven strategies and options that you can use to help let more light into your home and give you a greater element of control. Using Transom window treatments, for instance, is a great way to allow natural light to come in while still giving you a good level of protection from the sun, especially when you consider their elevated position.
Ultimately, it’s often a combination of things that work together to help increase the levels of natural light that are invited into your home. You don’t need to do any expensive renovations such as removing walls or changing your windows to achieve your aims, you just need to deploy some proven tactics and tools.
Here’s some useful insights that reveal the secrets behind how you can let more natural light into your home.
Color is a key factor
One of the most important factors that will allow you to enjoy a good level of natural light is to choose your color scheme with care.
Painting your walls will provide the backdrop needed to maximize your levels of natural light coming in from outside, as long as you choose a color and shade that has the best abilities to reflect natural light.
Interior designers use a proven measurement to help achieve this aim. It is called Light Reflectance Value (LRV). This measurement tells you how much light a specific color reflects. In a nutshell, the scale is between one and one hundred. The higher the value, the more light reflective the color and shade will be.
Putting this into practice. If you choose a color such as an off-white shade, or even something that has warm undertones such as cream or yellow, these choices offer a high LRV number and an attractive balance that looks great while making the room instantly feel lighter and airier.
The right window treatments make a difference
How you cover your window will not only have an impact from a design perspective it will also make a difference to how you control the levels of natural light that are allowed into your home.
When too much sunlight comes into your room and you don’t have any control it can quickly transform your environment into a space that can even feel harsh and uninviting when there’s too much natural light. The trick is often to use window treatments that deliver a good level of protection from harsh sunlight but are soft and sheer enough to allow just the right amount of natural light into your space.
Think carefully about choosing the right window treatments. Talk to your supplier about how exposed to natural sunlight, or how dark your room is, as this will allow them to offer a knowledgeable solution.
Mirrors are proven interior design trick
There is universal agreement amongst a plethora of interior designers that if you want to encourage the most amount of natural light into a room one of the best ways to do this would be to strategically place mirrors so that they reflect the light as it comes in, brightening up a space as a result.
Usually, the best position for your mirror to encourage the most amount of natural light would be to place it opposite your window. When your mirror is in this position it is the optimum setting for letting all of that wonderful natural light bounce around the room, but in a controlled way.
Consider using reflective materials
In addition to using mirrors for their reflective qualities you might also want to consider using reflective materials to further enhance your options and give you the best amount of light.
Good examples of suitably reflective materials would be metal and quartz. These are very adept at reflecting light and deliver a very similar impact on a room as mirrors.
Using a combination of mirrors and reflective materials will allow you to enjoy the most options when it comes to controlling how much natural light comes into your room.
A good way to control your options
Another key consideration is what you use across and around your window frame. What this means is that you should think about what sort of curtain rods you use and how you position them so that your drapes can be fully opened to allow as much light as possible in.
A good tip would be to set up your curtain rods so that they allow your drapes to open a good twelve inches beyond the window frame on each side. When you create a setup like this you maximize your opportunity to control how much natural light you let in. If your curtain rods are too restrictive you will be limiting how much light can enter your space because the drapes are not able to fully open to the extent of the window width.
Think about how you place furniture
Last but not least, it pays to think about where you place large items of furniture as they could obstruct natural light in the wrong setting.
If you have a tall cabinet in the room, for example, if that is placed too near the window, or in a place that blocks the sunlight, it could not only damage the furniture over time but also inhibit levels of natural sunlight.
A good interior designer tip would be to not only take this suggestion into consideration but also consider putting tall furniture in a way that they face the light, but don’t obstruct it.
This would enable you to avoid blocking sunlight and darken the room, albeit unintentionally.
Whatever actions you take to improve your levels of natural lighting you should take inspiration that if you get all of these actions right you will be able to enjoy a room that is instantly nore spacious and inviting.
From window treatments to how you place large items of furniture, everything you do could have a huge impact on how much natural sunlight you enjoy.
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