Best lighting for an office with no windows

July 18, 2019 12:47 PM

I have recently moved offices to an interior office with no windows. It's about 6x11 feet, maybe 6x12. Right now it's lit by overhead fluorescent lights that I find somewhat depressing and dingy. I think that my workplace will pay for a reasonably priced lamp to improve the lighting situation, but I'm not sure what to look for.

I've tried to do research online, but there don't seem to be many comparative resources that are not ads for this question. Basically, I am looking for something that will light up the whole office in a cheerful way and make me long less for the days when I had a window with natural lighting.

If it's relevant, I do most of my work on a computer, but also spend some time reading paper documents.

I know that bulbs are very important here, but I don't understand the difference between the different types of bulbs (ie fluorescent, incandescent, LED). I don't understand the different measurements of bulbs (watts, lumens, etc). I also don't understand what work the lamp does vs. what work the bulb does.

Thanks in advance-- I really appreciate any help with this!

posted by Henrietta Stackpole to Shopping (6 answers total)

I can't advise to bulb choice, but I have the same sort of office and despise the overhead fluorescent lighting. Instead, I have several lamps that throw light upward (a couple standing torch lamps and two desktop lamps) and one task lighting desk lamp, that throws light down onto my reading/writing surface (switched on and off as necessary).

I don't have resources to link to, but I have a couple interior architects / designers in my life and both suggested that uplighting would create the most pleasant ambient lighting in a space with no natural light.
posted by crush at 1:11 PM on July 18, 2019

The first thing I would do is change out the light bulbs in the fluorescent fixtures. The bulbs come in three "colors" - warm, cool and daylight. or warm, bright and daylight. Most offices use the cool/bright bulbs. I switched by office to warm colored bulbs which are more like home lighting (at least if you use incandescent bulbs at home). If you want something brighter but not dingy, try daylight bulbs instead.

By the way, I tried to use lamps in the my office and it takes multiple of lamps to get enough brightness for me to feel like the room is bright enough to work in. So, unless you like to feel like you are working by candlelight, you might want to do something about the overhead bulbs even if you do add a light.
posted by metahawk at 1:16 PM on July 18, 2019

I love this desk lamp from Room and Board. It's sturdy, adjustable, dimmable, and puts out great light.
posted by Ostara at 1:48 PM on July 18, 2019

The bulb is crucial. I now make sure I buy bulbs that say "soft" or "warm" on the packaging.

The popular colors available for LEDs are "warm white" or "soft white," and "bright white." Warm white and soft white will produce a yellow hue, close to incandescents. (CNET)

Here are more (NYmag) tips (Lowes)
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:57 PM on July 18, 2019

I use several of Target's dirt-cheap torchieres (one the slightly more expensive one with an additional gooseneck reading lamp) with white-range-only (cheaper than color) Hue bulbs in them so I can keep them on an extremely warm color most of the time but switch them over to daylight temperature if I'm doing fine detail/craft/assembly tasks.
posted by Lyn Never at 2:38 PM on July 18, 2019

LED bulbs come in an array of colors labeled by temperature, oddly enough, because Physics. If you go to a good hardware store, you can find a display showing the differences. Rugs and curtains and wall colors may look great with one kind of bulb and hideous with another, so some experimentation may be required.
posted by SemiSalt at 2:47 PM on July 18, 2019