When designing a room, office, or even a whole new home, we very carefully select a color scheme, lighting fixtures, chandeliers, and functional furniture to allow the correct use of the spaces. Many people don’t necessarily realize that all this careful planning can be meaningless if we don’t pay attention to the color temperature of the actual bulbs selected to light the space.
During these times when many of us are setting up a home office, it’s important to make the right choice when it comes to matching up the temperature to how we work. Since LED bulbs are the most environmental, we’ll focus on the options available with LED lights.
Color temperature is measured with Kelvins (K) and runs on a scale from 1000K, representing soft, yellow candlelight, and 10000K, representing pure sunlight. The measurement relates to the light that will return from a black object in the space. The range that’s mostly available when it comes to LED lights is 2700K (“warm white”) to 5000K (“cold white” or “daylight”).
When it comes down to the actual choices, it’s mostly a matter of taste, while daylight temperature of 5,000K or higher may be a shocking brightness for some, it gives a refreshing clean tone in the eyes of others. A general tip light designers share with buyers is to use the same color temperature throughout a space to give it a cleaner, cohesive feel.
