Choosing the right ways to light your living room really is important. After all, the living room is an important multi-use space.

It’s probably one of the largest rooms in your home, it’s a great gathering place for family and friends, and it’s likely also one of the most-used rooms in your home. For all these reasons (and more), I understand why you really want to get the lighting right!

From your letter, I also can see that you’re open to some new ideas and creative options as far as lighting goes.

And I certainly appreciate how you’re approaching lighting your living room as a new and fun opportunity to tackle.

From my many years of experience doing interior design, there aren’t many things more exciting to me than approaching a room as a blank canvas upon which to create some art and inspiration!

Bringing Layers of Light to Your Living Room

When it comes to transforming any of your rooms – many people start by placing some large, ambient lighting in the center of the room, and then try to figure out how to add lighting accents around the perimeter. While that may be a common approach, it isn’t necessarily the best approach.

Personally, I like to start by deciding where I want to place smaller lighting accents and features, and then work my way towards inserting any central lighting fixtures – if I use them at all.

A good rule of thumb is to start by deciding how you use the room the most, or how you want to use the room.

Build some lighting anchor points around those functions, and then you can add lighting layers from there, as needed or desired. What might those layers include? Well, keep reading to learn more!

Some Bright Ideas for Living Room Lighting Inspiration

The best lighting for a living room will typically include a balance of ambient lighting, task lighting, and accent lighting. What’s the difference?

Ambient lighting is designed to bring a general level of light to the whole room. Task lighting is meant to illuminate specific task or activity areas.

And accent lighting? It’s not there to generate light for the room, per se, but rather exists to highlight specific features of the room that you want people to notice.

Now that we’ve got those concepts established and have laid down a baseline of understanding around layered lighting, let’s look at some different types of living room lighting you might consider:

Overhead Lighting

I honestly believe that overhead lighting should be one of the last layers to consider, but since it’s probably the first thing many folks think of, I’m listing it here first. When it comes to overhead lighting, your options are…