5 Ideas To Use LED Lights For

Light shapes how we perceive the world. It’s not just a way to see what’s around us. It directs and modifies how we focus our attention in a space, how we feel the warmth of a space, and how we establish a sense of comfort in a space — whether you’re inside or outside. It can even impact the texture of space. 

Think about the last time you sat in direct sunlight at noon in August. Everything was lit evenly. It was harsh. You likely had to shield your eyes. 

Now, think about the last time you sat under a tree at around 6 p.m. in late September. The sun was lower. Light had to pass through the branches of a tree, diffusing the intensity and creating a pattern of shadows amid the light. It may have been calming.

That concept goes for interior lighting as well. Would you prefer to work at a desk in your home with white fluorescent overhead lighting that buzzes, or would you rather a warm office lamp that’s diffused and directed by a shade to your subject of focus?

There are ways to use light in novel ways to affect the mood, decor, utility, depth, and celebration in an area. 

Create A Mood With LED lights

Daylight balanced, warm white, unique colors — however you choose, the concept remains the same: the color of a light will change the mood. Every movie you’ve ever watched in a theater had at least one crew member on set that critically considered the lighting that affected the mood in a scene. 

It’s a manipulation of emotions that doesn’t just have to be on your TV screen. The same thing can be achieved in a bedroom.

A string of LED lights over a bed can cast the room in a soft glow that’s pleasing to the eye. Some people raise their bed on a slatted wood pallet and string lights beneath the pallet to create a strangely comforting and new way to open up the room.

The creative opportunities are endless. A good exercise on generating ideas for mood is to enter a room and think about where a string of lights can be installed in an untraditional spot. The effects could be memorable and long-lasting, speaking of which…

Use LED Lights To Reinvent Decor

LED lights can be, in and of themself, a decorative item, or a way to accentuate an item, spot, or complete room. This one is an obvious idea, but it can be executed in new ways.

Think about everything on the walls in a space. What if one of these pieces of decor, like a square painting, was exactly replaced with rows of LED light bulbs? It could then double as a light fixture and a different way to break up bare walls with illumination instead of a static object.

LED lights can be strung across open spaces, like a patio, to add structure overhead, like you’re creating a ceiling with light. They can also be added to the perimeter of a space to create a bright spot that functions as a visible barrier in the dark, be it outside in a backyard or around a door frame. An LED light string can even be added along the bottom of a wall along a hallway as a wayfinder. There are also clips available for sculptures or other household items.

Light is eye-grabbing. Control it and you control the experience of those around it. It can be used as a focal point in other ways, too.

LED Light Strings Have Utility In Photography

Did you know LED light strings are a tool in photography? Professionals use them as a way to enhance the specular highlights in the background — or the blurry blobs of light that are out of focus. The blurred out area in the background of photos is called “bokeh,” which is pronounced “bow-kay”.

It comes from a Japanese word that means out-of-focus blur, or blur quality, which was introduced to the photography community in a 1997 edition of Photo Techniques and is often mispronounced as “bow-kuh.”

Anyway, each pop of light in bokeh comes from a single source. A string of LED lights can be framed around a subject far in the background to create a frame around the subject. 

How do you apply this idea if you’re not a pro photographer? Easy. Just switch your phone camera to portrait mode, keep the light string far behind your subject, and voila! You have a unique Facebook profile photo.

It’s a play on depth, which brings us to the next idea.

Use LED Lights As A Way To Add Depth To A Space

Color temperature is a way to separate areas of a space. A blue light in one corner of a room and a warm, orange lamp on a desk in another area of the room will visually identify differences in location by differences in color, thereby adding depth to a room.

There are different color temperatures in different LED lights, 3200K being warm orange and 5600k being daylight white. They can be used to different effects, alongside colored bulbs, like red, green, blue, the list goes on. 

The point here is that LED lights can be added to different areas in different colors to create a distinction in the appearance, and therefore identity, of a space. 

Creating a distinction in location with lighting brings us to the last, quick point.

Celebrate In A Unique Way With LED Lights

Events can be a formal affair with chandeliers and dome lighting and whatever else.

Want to add a unique touch? Light the space with an LED string. It will make the venue approachable and memorable. The even spread of lights, too, will diffuse and soften the spread of light instead of hard splashes of light or dull flattened overhead lighting.

It could feel folksy with larger bulbs or festive with more compact bulbs. The point here is to do away with what’s established and create your own lighting experience. LED lights are flexible enough to be molded to any occasion.