Selecting the perfect lighting solutions for your home or workplace can be a highly vexatious undertaking, but just by understanding the essential criteria, you can make the process effortlessly simple and actually enjoyable, rather than stressful and time consuming. Here’s a quick summary of our general framework from our lighting automation team to assist you and your client in selecting the best lighting for your specific requirements.

1. Assess Lighting Requirements: Evaluating each room within the property will allow you to determine all of your specific lighting requirements. As different rooms serve totally different purposes, the level of lighting should consistently reflect that.

• Living Room/Study: This space typically needs a combination of ambient, task, and accent lighting. Consider floor lamps, table lamps, and dimmable ceiling lights.
• Kitchen/Office/Workshop: Bright task lighting is essential in the kitchen or an office or workshop, specifically above any workspaces such as countertops and the stove. Under-cabinet lighting and pendant lights are excellent choices for background illumination.
• Bedrooms: Opt for a lighting mix heavy on the ambient lighting with a touch of task lighting. Bedside lamps with adjustable brightness can create a cosy atmosphere while providing enough light for reading.
• Bathrooms/Toilets/Changing Rooms: Bright, clear light is often a chosen requirement here. Vanity lights and overhead fixtures that optimise illumination and reduce shadows work best here.

2. Considering Different Types of Lighting: Understanding and knowing how the different types of lighting that are available are defined will thoroughly assist in designing a well-lit and balanced environment, whatever the requirements are.

• Ambient Lighting: Often the main or primary source of lighting in any given room, providing overall illumination. Ceiling-mounted fixtures, chandeliers, and recessed lights are common options.
• Task Lighting: Focus lighting for specific areas where activities like reading, cooking, or work tasks are performed. Desk lamps, under-cabinet lights, and pendant lights are some of the classic task lighting solutions.
• Accent Lighting: Adds emotive value and is frequently used to highlight certain features within a room, such as centrepiece artwork, favourite house plants, or favoured architectural details. Wall sconces, track lighting, and spotlights are often some of the most popular choices.
• Natural Lighting: Maximising natural light intake into your property or space can reduce the need for additional artificial lighting and creates a warm, bright and comfortable atmosphere. The use of large windows, skylights, and lightly coloured décor makes the most of natural light, enhancing the warmth and brightness of a particular room.

3. Consider Energy Efficiency: Optimising energy-efficient lighting solutions during the design process not only helps to reduce electricity bills but also helps to protect the environment. LED lights are now the most popular choice due to their longevity and low energy consumption. Smart bulbs that can be programmed and controlled via an integrated automation system can also contribute to energy savings and cost efficiency.

4. Choose the Right Bulbs The type of bulb you choose can significantly impact the quality of light in a room. LED bulbs are the safest, most energy-efficient and versatile option, available in various colours and temperatures. LEDs are the definitive contemporary choice of bulb unless you have very particular lighting requirements, with the older, less energy efficient incandescent and CFL bulbs providing a warmer light.

5. Focus on Colour Temperature Colour temperature can have a huge effect on the mood and overall ambience of a room or space and can also depend on whether it is day or night when determining the temperature that’s best.

• Warm White (2700K-3000K): Creates a relaxing, cosy atmosphere, suitable for living rooms and bedrooms.
• Cool White (3500K-4100K): Ideal for kitchens, bathrooms, and workspaces where best clarity of vision and bright light is required.
• Daylight (5000K-6500K): Best for reading nooks, study areas, and places where high visibility is also essential.

6. Automate Smart Lighting Solutions Automated Smart Lighting Systems allow you to control your lights remotely, set schedules, and adjust brightness and colour. Brands like Philips Hue and Wyze offer basic smart lighting systems that integrate with voice assistants like Alexa and Google Assistant, although at Mayflower we focus on taking lighting a step further with automated and programmable Lutron and Rako lighting systems often involved with our designs.

7. Budget Considerations Our state-of-the-art automated lighting solutions offer many features and offer the best in terms of programmability and optimised functionality, although there are plenty of other affordable options that can provide excellent performance for those on a restricted budget.

8. Installation and Maintenance Whether Mayflower are installing the lighting system or you hire your own preferred professional, some lighting systems, especially automated smart lighting installations, may require a more complex installation process and circuitry and wiring. Regular maintenance as provided by our acclaimed aftercare service, such as cleaning fixtures, replacing bulbs, and testing wiring and circuitry ensures your lighting remains effective and aesthetically pleasing in terms of your lighting requirements.

Testing Residential and Commercial Automated Lighting Designs

Mayflower London understands that selecting and designing an automated lighting system that is perfect for your needs and your property can be trying. That’s why our team will rigorously test each and every product that is selected to be part of the lighting system design to ensure it meets the highest standards for performance, energy efficiency, reliability, and user satisfaction.

1. Installation and Setup

Ease of Installation: We start by assessing how easy it is to install each and every part of your bespoke automated smart lighting system. Our team follows our tried and tested methodology, employing special tools or additional expertise where required.

App Integration: We optimise the compatibility of our automated lighting systems with their respective mobile apps, evaluating the user interface, ease of navigation, and the app’s overall responsiveness on every type of mobile device with which it is compatible. 

2. Performance

Brightness and Colour Accuracy: Using professional light meters, we measure the brightness and colour accuracy of each lighting installation in each room, assessing the full spectrum of colours and whites to ensure the lights perform well in specified settings, moods, and times of day. 

Response Time: We evaluate how quickly the lights respond to commands via dedicated interfaces, apps, or voice assistants. Instantaneous and consistent response times are a hallmark of a seamless experience with an automated smart lighting system.

Connectivity and Range: We test the system and all of the lights for connectivity issues, such as lag or disconnection. We also assess the range of any additional smart lights independent from the main lighting system, ensuring they remain connected and responsive even when placed far from the router or hub.

3. Functionality

Customisation Options: Automated Smart Lighting Systems come with various features like scheduling, routines, and scenes. Our team programs and tests these functionalities to enable easy customisation and automation of lighting settings according to daily routines and preferences.

Energy Efficiency: Our team routinely measures the power consumption of every automated smart lighting system we design and install to ensure they are as energy-efficient as possible. This helps in reducing electricity bills and environmental impact.

Durability and Longevity: Our testing includes stress testing to simulate long-term use. We check for any degradation in performance over time and ensure that the system, the lights, and all circuitry and wiring are built to last, future-proofing your property’s lighting for years to come.

4. User Experience

Ease of Use: We evaluate the overall user experience from end-to-end, from the initial setup to daily usage. This includes the intuitiveness and user friendliness of the chosen app, the reliability of voice commands, and the overall satisfaction of using the automated smart lighting system in contrast to the previous lighting setup.

Support and Documentation: We review the quality of customer support provided by the manufacturers for any parts used in the lighting system. This includes the online and hard copy availability of manufacturer resources and assessing the responsiveness and quality of their customer service.

5. Real-Life Scenarios

Practical Application: We test our automated smart lighting systems in various real-life scenarios, such as setting up timed scenario or mood lighting in different rooms across a property and its outdoor areas. This helps us get a better understanding of how the lighting system performs in different environments and how it satisfies client requirements .

Special Features: Automated Smart Lighting Systems come with programmable features such as visual or audio synchronisation, motion detection activated lighting, and geo-fencing. Our team always fully tests any features such as these to ensure that they enhance the user experience and the chosen atmosphere for the property, optimising functionality and sustainability whilst providing the ultimate daily convenience.

Contact us today on 02077220067 for a consultation and take the first step towards a fully integrated automated lighting system and experience its ultimate convenience.