April 2019: The Newest Inspiration

Posted by Raelle Bell on Wednesday, February 12, 2020

Issue No. 100

April 2019

Your newest inspiration guide is here.

The 2019 Lighting magazine is all new and full of beautiful photos, helpful tips and inspiring ideas for your home. Pick up a free copy at your local ALA-member showroom, or click below for a digital view.


	Get LIGHTING magazine

TREND TALK: Lighting magazine is your style source.

Crystorama Lighting

Look to the 2019 issue of Lighting magazine to see what’s on trend for every room in your home.

Kitchen: With many homes now featuring high ceilings, large pendants are replacing tiny pendants.

Dining room: A single fixture can look beautiful, but multiple chandeliers or pendants add visual interest and are all the rage today.

Bedroom: For an air of sophistication, many homeowners are choosing chandeliers, rather than flush-mount fixtures, for this space.

Bathroom: The days of relying on often-unflattering, above-sink strip lighting are in the past. Sconces on each side of the mirror are the popular choice for a more updated and complimentary look.

Kichler Lighting

GET SMART: Update your home with latest tech.

Acuity Brands

Great lighting is about more than beautiful fixtures. It's also about being smart. With a "smart" or "connected" control, you can set your lights to automatically turn on at pre-set times or upon entering a room. It lets you change the mood or scene of a space with a handheld device, such as a smart phone or iPad, or with a voice command, making family movie night special. When your home is connected, all you have to do to control the amount of natural light indoors is signal your shades to raise or lower as much as you want.

These conveniences and safety features are easy to install. For the latest about making your home smart, pick up a copy of Lighting magazine at your local ALA-member showroom or get a free digital copy at ALALightingMagazine.com.

Lutron Electronics

EXPERT ADVICE: Ask a lighting professional.

I have an outdated light box (shown above) with four fluorescent bulbs in my kitchen. It provides a tremendous amount of light, but looks old fashioned. What are some updated alternatives that will provide an equivalent amount of light?

--Michelle C.

Add your own taaaaaaaaxt to tell a story or spread the word!

Fixtures like the rectangular one you describe are now mostly obsolete. Fluorescent lighting has been replaced to a large extent by LED fixtures. One challenge is that today's LED fixtures for surface mounting applications are typically much smaller what you have now. If you replace your existing fixture with a smaller fixture (like the round fixtures shown below), you will need to do some painting and repair to your ceiling.

Typically, a 4-ft. fluorescent light bulb used in residential applications produces about 2200-2400 lumens. If your fixture uses four bulbs, your total lumen output is in the range of 8,800 to 9,600 lumens. Based on this, you need a fixture with at least 8,800 lumens. However, this may be difficult to find as many of today’s LED fixtures are smaller than your fixture (assuming it is 2 ft. x 4 ft.).

Your best bet is to visit a local ALA-member lighting showroom. There you will find displays of appropriate and attractive fixtures to suit your application.