Lighting is a key consideration when you’re decorating any room, especially an office.

You’ll probably be spending a lot of time working at home so it’s important you get your home office lighting right.

If it’s too dim, you could feel unmotivated or even end up dropping off to sleep. If it’s too bright, you may end up feeling stressed and getting eye strain and headaches.

There are lots of options when it comes to home office lighting. For example, a ceiling light may provide just the lighting that you need, or a skylight may be enough during the day, with lamps at night, if you prefer natural light where possible.

If you need to do lots of close work or look at documents and files after dark, you may also need to consider desk and/or free-standing lamps.

When considering the lighting needs for your home office, think first about how your office is laid out. Where are you in relation to any windows and how much natural light will they give? This will help you work out what kind of lighting equipment you need and where you should place it for the best effect.

Home office lighting health and safety

As well as window placement, you also need to think about where equipment such as computers and printers will be. This could have an impact on plug sockets. It’s also important because computer screen glare can hurt your eyes, so you’ll need to avoid making this worse with your placement of lighting. Make sure that if you’re using any desk or overhead lamps that they don’t reflect from the screen, potentially causing eye strain, headaches and even migraines in the worst-case scenario.

Your home office lighting should be bright enough that it is comfortable and easy to work in but not so harsh that the light is glaring.

You can also use lighting to add to the mood of your home office and to highlight key areas. For example, spotlights can be used to draw the eye to certain information or achievements. Coloured lights and interesting light shades and fittings can add to the character of your room, making it look modern and cutting-edge or vintage and whimsical, for example.

Use home office lighting to maximise your working comfort and create the right mood and atmosphere in your work space. Use showrooms, magazines and anything else that inspires you to get ideas for lighting to suit your home office.