Does your living room have lights?

[Don M]

I go along with Mick, no ceiling lights in the living room or family room. The halls, kitchen, dining and library have ceiling fixtures. The bedrooms do not. Most rooms have switched outlets for floor or table lamps. Of course my 1830s stone house had no electricity when built! I think floor or table lamps make the rooms seem more homey & inviting.

[Powermuffin]

I don't know if our 1908 house originally had ceiling lights, but I think not. It did have lights in both the sitting room (a fan with a light) and the dining room (a fluorescent shop light) when we moved in. We switched these lights. When we refurbished the kitchen, which had one ceiling light, we found that adding two more ceiling lights and a small light over the sink was more than adequate. I am an avid cook and the lighting works very well for us. All the lights are period appropriate. I had a lot of fun finding reproduction lighting for our house.

[phil]

Part of me wants to put lights on the living room ceiling. Mine didnt' have any originally. If I put two I know Ill have trouble finding anything vintage that matches. I made that mistake in the kitchen already

I can wire them to my three way switches so that they can be turned on from entering the room from either end. the two plugs can be on the same switch. maybe it's an excuse to add some fancy lights that at least appear to match the era.

[ratherhaverain]

I like the looks of ceiling lights just to make that big flat space more interesting, but don't like the glare most of them seem to have. We love ours but rarely turn them on because of that. The hunt for some great lights would be fun--and yeah, maybe a bit frustrating. At least we have Etsy, CL and such these days.

[DavidP]

My house (supposedly 1904, perhaps earlier) had electricity when it was built. There was a light fixture in the center of each room downstairs, described rather quaintly as a "lamp hook" on the plans. The original K&T is still there and in use, although the original fixtures are long gone. The upstairs bedrooms and hall had two sconces each, some of which remain.

I replaced the horrible 1960s fixtures in the parlor and the entrance hall with reproduction lights, whose curlicues are very similar to shapes cast into the radiators (original). Back in the day, bulbs gave very little light compared to modern ones. So low wattage bulbs, or even reproduction ones, can help avoid the glare of modern lights.

[SouthernLady]

My house was built c. 1884, pre-electricity in a farming community. No gas hookups, either. The only lighting consisted of oil lamps and/or candles. Sometime during the '20s (I suspect during the daughter's renovation when she inherited the house), electricity was added and outlets were placed in odd places. Although I have lights in the center of the ceiling in each room, I am planning to remove them and go with floor and table lamps. In my parlor, all of the lamps are wired oil lamps. I rarely use the ceiling fixture because it's kind of harsh. I have opted to do a combination of oil lamps and electrified oil lamps throughout the house. If my ceilings were not so very low (7'), I would probably purchase the period lamps that hang from the ceiling, but for my farmhouse this isn't practical. Unless someone likes to smack their head upside the fixtures. I have enough trouble coming down the staircase!

[Mick_VT]

If my ceilings were not so very low (7'), I would probably purchase the period lamps that hang from the ceiling, but for my farmhouse this isn't practical. Unless someone likes to smack their head upside the fixtures. I have enough trouble coming down the staircase!

The secret is to hang them above tables

[Nicholas]

I was told by the original resident who recently visited me that there were ceiling lights: wires with a lightbulb hanging from them.

When we got the house there was only one boob light in one of the bedrooms, and one in the bathroom.

What we did was hook up an old timey looking chandelier in the dining room, but wanted a ceiling fan in the LR. There was only one cieling fan with the lights pointed upwards instead of in your face, and it was a display fan at Lowes, a discontinued product. So I grabbed the display at a discount.

The DR chandelier is on a dimmer, the LR ceiling fan has the remote control with dimming lights and fan speed. I do like the effect at night with these lights, with the tongue and groove walls it has a rustic cabin like feel:

[Sinoed]

In my c. 1895 house the kitchen, dining room and living room had single ceiling lights. I also had original lights on the porch outside. I think these were done because they were the "presentation" rooms - there is quite a bit of decorative molding and fancy register covers downstairs. My home is located close to the downtown area and I think it was built as a bit of showpiece for the small village at the time.

The hallway and upstairs bedrooms didn't have any fixtures. When I replaced the electrical a few months ago, the electrician removed original knob and tube from the living room, dining room, kitchen and porch while the bedrooms had a later aluminum update. I did have one bedroom that still didn't have a ceiling light or switch that I fixed during the update.

Whether your house had lights might depend on where your house is and whether it was designed to receive guests like mine.