Homes full of natural light feel larger, and research shows that homes filled with light makes us feel better. It lightens our mood, makes us more productive, and strengthens our sleep cycle. So the best thing you can for your home is to let the sun shine.
There are many ways to bring natural light into your home. Here are five changes that will not only bring in the light, but they will add value to your home.
1. Take Down Walls
We all know that open floor plans are the design of choice for modern homes. They maximize space and enhance flow from room to room. If you have an older home and can open the walls in the house to increase line of sight from front to back, it can bring light through the windows from both sides of the house.
2. Put in Larger Windows
Once the house is open from front to back, put in larger windows. Top choices are floor to ceiling windows (or almost to the floor), especially with large panes and an industrial look. If you have flipped through any interior design book or magazine in the last several years, you have seen this style.
Remodelista recently ran an article on steel frame windows and doors. According to the article, “The aesthetic harkens back to the greenhouses, factories, and warehouses of the 19th century. And their elegant, narrow sight lines offer unobstructed views, blurring the boundaries between indoors and out.”
3. Add French Doors
Steel framed French-style doors are also available. If you put in the windows, also add the doors for a clean and modern look. They can give a mid-century brick bungalow a totally current look, but work well with the older style home. They also look great in a contemporary home, or even a Victorian cottage.
If the steel doors are too pricey for your budget, there are many less pricey options to give the same affect but with different styling.
4. Cut Back Bushes and Low Hanging Trees
While bushes and trees can add great drama to a home, make sure to keep them away from windows, and think twice before allowing creeping flowers to grow around doors.
Landscape designers add lots of bushes and flowers to add curb appeal, but as time goes by those plants can overgrow, and untended rose gardens can become a jumble of thorns.
Trees are important to provide shade, which keeps heating and cooling costs down, but it is best to keep them far enough away to allow in the natural light.
5. Choose Light Colored Flooring and Paint Colors
Your choice of colors on floors and walls can make a huge difference to the way light is carried through the room. Light colors reflect light. That is why so many designers use so much white.
Dark, rich colors have been chosen by the various paint companies and the color people, Pantone, as colors of the year, but these deep colors will drink in the light making rooms darker and smaller.
If you want to use these deep colors in your home, but want to bring in the natural light, use them as an accent color. A pop of Ultra Violet, Pantone’s Color of the Year, or a splash of Benjamin Moore’s Caliente (hot red).
Pair your light colored walls with light wood flooring, or light colored tile on floors and/or walls. There are many finishes used on flooring to give it a unique look, like bleaching.
These are only a few of the ways you can bring light into your home. Mirrors, or skylights are other options.
Every home can take advantage of one or more of these ideas to bring the spring and summer light from the outside in to brighten every room and bring joy to its occupants.
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