Lighting the Throne Room
It doesn’t matter if your ideal bathroom is a dreamy under-the-sea playground, a romantic spa, a wood-paneled sporting club or a clinically bright surgical room. The newest innovative lighting designs and fixtures are changing the way you will literally see your bathroom, whatever your desire.
In the most evocative new bathroom designs, light comes from unusual places. It seeps out from beneath floating vanities, emits brightly from mirrored surfaces, sparkles from pendants, even peeks through your toes from linear drains.
Indirect glow
The lighting in your bathroom can be as striking or as subtle as you and your designer conspire to make it.
LED light gleams from niches, lending a sense of space to a small bathroom. (Contemporary Bathroom by London Interior Designers & Decorators Ardesia Design)
Filtered light from many sources – including a contemporary linear fireplace – make this bathroom glimmer.
Light from pendants, recesses, sconces and behind textured glass enhances the luster of the rich woods and tiles in this large spa-like bathroom. (Austin General Contractors, David Wilkes Builders)
This contemporary bathroom features subtle downlighting beneath a floating vanity and has sconces flanking the mirrors (Carbondale Interior Designers & Decorators Lanthia Hogg Designs.)
The mirrors slide left and right to light this Teakwood Builders bathroom with nature’s healthy shine, then back to the center when nighttime privacy is needed.
Lights under floating cabinetry enhance safety and a sense of space and cleanliness. (Modern Bathroom by Other Metro Bathroom Designers & Remodelers The Inside Project)
Electric mirrors
When LED (light-emitting diode) technology was applied to residential lighting a couple of decades ago, the bulbs and fixtures weren’t an instant hit. The light was too coldly blue or green and even though they lasted a long time, they were expensive. As the technology has advanced, the dramatically lower energy consumption and longer-lasting bulbs have remained, but the color has changed to include the warm, yellowish light that many people prefer at home.
That’s not all that has happened. Designers and manufacturers are getting increasingly creative about how to use these powerful, cool-burning lights.
LEDs mirrors by Electric Mirror produce bright – but not harsh- light right where it is needed. A chandelier over the tub adds sparkle and glamour to this Teakwood Builders master bath.
The TV screen embedded in the bathroom mirror disappears when it is turned off. (Williston Park Kitchen & Bath Designers. Kitchen Designs by Ken Kelly, Inc.)
LED 6000K Daylight color, BM Illuminated Bathroom Mirror “PARIS” 96 X 28 in
Technicolor Showers
Okay, glow-in-the-dark showers may not be for everyone, but you gotta admit–they are just plain fun. If, for you, a shower or bath is not just about a quick wash, but is an opportunity for hydrotherapy, why not take it a step further to chromatherapy? A little purifying white, stimulating yellow, serene turquoise, energizing red, harmonious green, fresh orange, creative magenta… whatever floats your boat.
Fixed or alternating color LEDs can be installed from ceiling to soap dish to drain depending on what makes you feel most relaxed and amused.
RGB Lumilen Strip Light
A starry shower experience. (Other Metro Architects & Building Designers Olivier Chabaud Architecte)
Four LED pool lights installed on the ceiling of this steam shower create this underwater aquarium feeling. (Vancouver Interior Designers & Decorators holger hoos design.)
Pendulous Elegance
From classic to ultra modern, a statement chandelier or pendant fixture can help a bathroom speak for itself.
Statement chandeliers that diffuse soft light
Gauzy privacy curtains gracefully diffuse natural light while a chandelier adds sparkle and elegance. (Melbourne Interior Designers & Decorators STUDIOMINT)
A Teakwood Builders master bath with a room-defining pendant and sconces.
Wire barn lights give a simple, transitional bathroom design a new focal point. (Transitional Bathroom by Los Angeles Interior Designers & Decorators Von Fitz Design)
This luxurious freestanding soaking tub surrounded by marble, serene blue paint and wall paper, is crowned by its crystal and polished nickel light fixture. Teakwood Builders, Inc.