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Interior Design vocabulary · Lighting

Natural light

Meaning in interior design, with examples

/ˌnætʃərəl ˈlaɪt/nounCore term

In interior design, natural light means: Light that comes from the sun through windows, doors and skylights, and changes in strength and colour through the day.

In Turkish: doğal ışık, gün ışığı

How it is used

One of the first things clients ask about and estate agents mention. Designers try to maximise, bring in or control natural light, and they check which way the windows face: in the northern hemisphere a north-facing room gets little direct sun.

Example sentences

  1. We used pale colours and a large mirror to bounce the natural light deeper into the room.

  2. The studio gets lots of natural light in the morning, so it's ideal for a home office.

Common collocations

  • maximise natural light
  • plenty of natural light
  • lack of natural light
  • bounce natural light
  • colour temperatureA measure of how warm (yellowish) or cool (bluish) white light looks, given in kelvins (K): about 2700 K is warm white and 5000 K or more looks like daylight.
  • window treatmentAnything used to dress or cover a window, such as curtains, blinds, shutters or sheers, for privacy, light control, insulation and decoration.
  • ambient lightingThe general, even light that fills a room and lets people move around safely, usually from ceiling lights, downlights or daylight.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Lighting

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