Luxury Housing Trends & Home Improvement Ideas

An enclosed porch off of your house is the perfect way to spend the fall and winter season. You can enjoy the snow falling without actually feeling the bite of Jack Frost. Although your porch might seem less romantic than having a dinner outside near your garden for two, you can spice things up a bit with an elegant lantern.

This Frosted Scroll Solar Lantern can be put right on your table-top as a fabulous centerpiece or extra decoration. The soft glow creates a relaxing or even romantic mood. The lanterns also come with stakes, so when the weather warms up again, you can put them in your garden.

Better yet is the fact that they are solar powered, so you don’t even need to waste your electricity. The frosted glass with scroll design will create an ambient atmosphere wherever you place it. This would make a great party decoration too.

After reading a few chapters from your captivating novel, you settle into bed, pull the covers over your shoulders and turn to your side to go to sleep. However, there’s one thing stopping you from going to sleep: the bedroom light. Now you have to get out of bed and turn it off, but what if you had a light switch right at your fingertips?

With the Instant Switch, you can turn off your bedroom light right from your bed. Installation is easy, because you don’t have to go through your drywall or pull wires. The switch contains a device that will control your light as long as it’s sitting in between the actual light switch and the lighting fixture. It has an on/off switch as well as a pop-in/out wall bracket. The Instant Switch can be 60 feet away from the lamp you want to control. So now you don’t have to get up to turn off the light when you’re already relaxed.

Are you trying to reduce your electric bill? Although installing solar panels is the best solution, it’s not always the most practical one for your wallet. You can at least replace your security lights with photoelectric lights.

The HomeFinder Flashing Screw-In Light Control from Westek is designed to turn on at dusk and to turn off at dawn. This photoelectric light control device can be used both indoors and outdoors. If you’re trying to increase the security of your home and save money and energy, this product can help you out.

In addition, it functions as an emergency flasher. If you have a first time visitor or an emergency vehicle coming to your home, all you have to do is flip the light switch twice. This initiates the emergency flasher, which can help alert neighbors, police or first time visitors. When you want to stop the emergency flasher mode, all you have to do is flip the switch one time. However, the flasher will shut off automatically after 20 minutes.

Gorgeous light fixtures can transform a room, but hand blown glass designs can be even more spectacular. If you want to pump up the drama in your dining room or entryway, consider alternative pieces of lighting that might be more modern and edgy.

Bear Creek Glass has an eclectic Lotus Chandelier, which is made from recycled hand blown glass and hand hammered copper. This fixture also has energy saving LED lights, so it reduces its use of electricity by 80 percent. The multi-colored lights can be set to amber, pink, blue or purple, and the height is adjustable. You can also purchase it with the white light globe if you don’t like the multi-colored glow.

Its dimensions are 30” high by 36” wide, and the intricate design and attention to detail will really make this lighting fixture stand out. Who knew that green lighting could be so efficient and divine looking?

Does your home have an off beat feel? Then you probably need some accessories to help bring all of the funky elements together in harmony. Stray Dog Designs has a variety of interesting pieces, and if you’re looking for lighting with a personality of its own, you’re sure to find a piece here.

The Miss Annette Floor Lamp has an iron base with curlicues at the bottom. The shade has thick horizontal strips of chocolate and white. More color is thrown in at the top with the deep green glass ball. The glass was mouthblown from recycled glass tops, and it adds a pop of color.

This floor lamp can add some character to your room as well as light with its three way bulb design. This lamp has traditional and modern elements wrapped up into one design, which makes it unique and interesting for any room in your home.

When it comes to outdoor lighting fixtures, the choices include: standard lamppost, pendants, scones, ceiling-mounted lamps and wall-mounted lamps. The finishes include brass, chrome, stainless steel, wrought iron, nickel, copper, bronze, pewter and verdigris. To make decision making even more complicated, the finishes can be polished, brushed, oiled antiqued or weathered. At least you know that when it comes to fixtures, you will be able to find the perfect one to match your home.

A traditional choice would be a wall-mounted sconce made from wrought iron, and if you have several of these on the side of your house, it makes for a recognizable design. Or you can have a different take on the lantern fixture, which is called the onion lamp. This design originated in New England, and it mimics the shape of an onion. The onion lamp is versatile in that it can be hung, carried or placed on a flat surface.

Installing low-voltage lighting around your home is a safe do-it-yourself project, because these lights usually require 12 volts of power instead of 120 volts. Outdoor lighting can accent certain areas of your yard or house, and it can also give you some security too.

There are a variety of low-voltage lighting designs such as spotlights, mushroom-shaped posts, polished-brass fixtures, well lights and lantern-styles. Spotlights or well lights can be nestled into flowerbeds, but if you want to light a pathway, a lantern-style can provide some glow where you need it the most. This style distributes light more evenly so the glow isn’t directly up or down.

Although you can save money with low-voltage systems, you can reduce your electricity bill by sticking with solar LED lanterns. The one below is on a shepherd hook, and it comes in rust or copper. It’s made from stainless steel, so it can withstand the elements too.

When it comes to lighting your entertainment space, there are so many options. Depending on the ambiance you want to achieve as well as what aspects of the room you want to highlight, you’re sure to find a perfect fit.

Wall-mounted track lighting is ideal over paintings or pictures on the wall that you want to enhance. Plus, these mounts are flexible and easy to mount close or away from the wall.

Light wedges provide geometric shapes of light on the wall, because they are mounted on the wall. These fixtures look best in a room with modern furniture and décor.

Wall sconces are versatile and can match almost any décor. Although they are meant for accent lighting, you can put halogen bulbs in them for maximum brightness.

Other lighting options include variable-color light fixtures (colored filters create colors), programmable entertainment lighting effects and limited-edition lighting fixtures (works of art).

Outdoor lighting should consist of primary lights that illuminate the space and secondary lights that set the mood. To incorporate both of these in your patio or deck, it’s best to determine the outdoor lighting before you build.

Some primary lights include wall-mounted sconces on the sides of doorways, pole-mounted fixtures along the path to the garden, floodlights for late night hot tub or pool parties and motion detectors for security purposes.

Secondary lights include lanterns strung near the patio furniture, strings of small lights for trees and shrubs and soft glowing landscape lights.

This tall Moroccan-style candle lantern has a unique look, which would provide a subtle glow around the outdoor dining area. The dimensions are 6 1/4” x 5 3/8” x 19” high. White Barn Gifts sells other Moroccan-style lanterns in blue, yellow and amber glass. Lanterns like this call for a relaxing dinner with friends or a romantic night with that special someone.

Having control over your lighting is an easy way to set the mood, and this was discussed in one of yesterday’s post about maximizing your media wall. Some dimmers can be tricky, because you have to click them once and then hold and sometimes your hands are faster than the dimmer.

Lutron has created Vierti, which is a single-touch dimmer that enables you to easily adjust the lighting with the swipe of your finger. These can be used in any room, but if you have movie theater room, the green or blue LED light on the dimmer can add some pizzazz. However, if you prefer to go the simple route, a white LED light is also available.

Vierti comes in more than 21 architectural-style wallplate colors and finishes too. Even at their highest brightness (100%), they save 4% of your energy. The dimmers also have an “At Rest Mode,” which is the mode they fade to if the light level hasn’t been recently adjusted.