Bathrooms are typically designed with minimal windows to gain privacy. But modern home architectures lay down some advantages of allowing natural light to pass through the bathroom. The natural light in the morning provides great rejuvenation in our body to get ready for the day ahead. Scientifically, the lack of exposure to sunlight is not good.

Lighting is crucial to how well your bathroom functions not just how good it looks.

Image via: Decor Pad

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Try these ways to bring natural light into your bathroom:

• Wash your windows more often because the dust the covers them prevents the natural light from coming in.
• To obtain visual privacy while admitting light, use frosted glass on your windows. It has the effect of rendering the glass translucent by scattering of light during transmission. It brings just enough natural light to warm up the space.
• Acquire light from adjoining spaces. Remove obstacles like interior walls so that one room can contribute to the lighting of other rooms. Increase transmittance through glass doors and windows. This technique will also allow your light to move from one room to another.
• Use mirrors to increase the sunlight in your bathroom. These reflect and bounce light around. Focus on where the light naturally strikes and place mirrors near those areas.
• Paint your bathroom walls in light colors. This will make the bathroom a lot larger and lights coming in are reflected.
• If you really want full access to the sky, add vaulted ceiling and/or a  skylight. It provides effective internal lighting, maximizes visual comfort and reduces energy use. A relaxing feeling to look up at the stars while enjoying a good steam.

Image via: Lookbook.Elledecor

Not only does natural light seem to put liveliness in you, it is also a basic human nutrient and is important for your health. The more natural light coming in, the happier and healthier you are. Of course, you also save considerable for electricity.

For more kitchen & bath ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

If you’ve checked your calendar or walked outside recently you’ve probably realized that spring is upon us. Spring is a time of warmth and sun, a welcome combination that often makes the inside world seem dark and dreary in comparison. For this reason, it is understandable that many people seek to maximize their home’s natural light during the spring season. Whether you’re looking for a quick fix or an extensive remodeling project, here are ten tips for accomplishing just that:

Image via: Apartment Therapy

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1. Free up your windows

Perhaps the best way to start is by clearing your windows of obstruction and opening them up to the sunlight. Many windows have bars or heavy drapes that prevent the maximum amount of light from getting through. Similarly, windows are often grimier – and consequently less clear – than they ideally could be.

2. Integrate your house with your yard

Sometimes the amount of natural light a home receives is just as much about perception as it is about reality. If your doors are open and if people are constantly going in and out of your house, for example, it is often easier to perceive that the home is getting its fair share of sun. As such, embracing your yard and your porch is a great way to help share the light this spring.

3. Repaint your walls

Dark walls absorb light while brighter walls tend to reflect it. On this note, painting your walls white is a great way to get more use out of the natural light that filters through your home’s windows.

4. Use reflective flooring

On a similar note, reflective floor surfaces can be equally helpful in creating a brighter interior space. The best options for this approach are white tile floors and well-shined hardwood flooring. Dark carpets, on the other hand, are generally to be avoided.

5. Remove foliage and other obstructions

If you have trees or shrubbery around your home, you probably appreciate the beauty they provide and have no desire to cut them down. But, by trimming strategically, you can remove a branch or two that allows for more light without decimating your trees.

Image via: BHG

6. Replace wood and brick with glass

Any wall in your home currently composed of wood, brick, or plaster can be replaced with glass so as to bring in more light. Since replacing a full wall is an incredibly expensive undertaking, many people choose instead to get rid of their wooden doors and put glass ones in their place – a far cheaper proposition. Glass can also be used as a reflective material in kitchen designs and other interior spaces.

7. Install a skylight

It goes without saying that a skylight can obviously help bring more natural light into your home. You can maximize its benefit by placing a new skylight in a room that, by design, doesn’t get much sun. Candidates include bathrooms, walk-in closets, and hallway corridors.

8. Enlarge your windows

Bigger windows will quickly translate into more light absorbed into your home. If you live in an older house with traditional square windows, an enlargement project of this sort could truly go a long way.

9. Raise your ceilings

Large rooms are usually more capable of trapping and reflecting natural light. Towards that end, knocking down your ceilings, eliminating your attic, and making your common areas taller can help these rooms feel far airier and brighter.

Image via: Greige Design.Blogspot

10. Maximize mirrors

There is one final reflective material that can be used to increase light: mirrors. While mirrors will surely bounce any sunlight onto opposing walls, make sure to position these mirrors so as to avoid directing the sun straight into a person’s eye.

These are ten of the main ways to bring more natural light into your home this spring. Natural light doesn’t simply prepare us for summer and help brighten our mood, but it can also revitalize your interior design when combined with an airy, reflective, and modernist scheme.

Warmer and sunnier weather is here; this spring, don’t let it pass your house by.

For more home interiors ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

You can spend a fortune on designer furniture, custom drapery, high-end finishes, and beautiful wall decor.  At the end of the day, if you don’t have enough natural light pouring into a space, none of the other decor items matter.

Natural light is the key to humans feeling at home, welcome and comfortable in their habitat.  Ever notice when you’re in a bad mood you want to retreat to a dark space? Then when you walk into a room with ample natural light, you instantly feel like you have a pick-me-up!

Look at these beautiful spaces that all have natural light.  Each one has a “come and stay” vibe to them, I love it!

Put a comfortable chair next to a window and it instantly becomes the best seat in the house.

Natural light in the bathroom makes all the difference in the world when waking up in the morning. It also helps see your natural skin in a true light, and it will make you feel happier.

Bring natural light into your kitchen and see how much time you love to spend there.

If you don’t have bright and airy spaces, consider using shear drapery to bring in more light.  If the colors are too dark in your home, consider painting with a lighter color palette.  You will thank yourself after you let more light into your living spaces.

For more lighting ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

Light: Like any other room in the house, if you can let natural light into the space, it will feel bigger. In laundry rooms there is not an exception to this rule.  Better Homes and Gardens has some good examples of how to maximize the feeling of space with windows.

Hide them!: Often times the laundry room has been formed from a large open space. Whether it’s a basement, garage, a curtain is a good way to hide the functions behind it.

Multipurpose Space: If you currently have a hallway or niche that turns into an all-in-one space, consider it for the washer and dryer!

With some imagination and design ideas, curtains, cabinetry, built-ins or furniture can serve as support area for laundry and other chores. Furnishism has a feature article with a multifunction laundry area. Combining laundry, craft, gift wrapping and counter, serves countless functions.

My Home Ideas, shows how a pantry closet was converted into a laundry area. I love the pullout shelf that allows for folding, or an extra work surface while standing at the washer and dryer.

Tip: Before changing a space into a laundry room, ask a professional electrician and plumber if water and electricity can be routed to the new area you want to use.  Lastly, dryers need to vent to the outdoors. Remember this, especially in multistory homes and interior spaces.

For more laundry ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

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