Optimise Your Space For Maximum Ideation
Many offices which are used for creative industries have a challenge when it comes to lighting. A wide variety of studies have shown that the human brain works best in a specific colour temperature range. At the same time, creative people work best with different amounts of light at different times of the day.
When you want to make your office more inspiring, you can’t simply change the colour temperature of your light bulbs. The result would be uncomfortable and might even lead to eyestrain and headaches. Subtle changes in colour temperature are one of the most valuable aspects of LED over incandescent or fluorescent lighting.
Color temperature is the measurement of light based on its white point. It is expressed in Kelvin (K). The colour temperature of the sun is 6,000 K. Daylight has a colour temperature of 5,000 to 6,000 K, and incandescent bulbs have a colour temperature of 2,700 to 3,000 K.
Color temperature matters. If you’re choosing LED lights for task lighting, you’ll want to consider colour temperature — the Kelvin scale measures the “warmth” of light from cool white (blue) to warm white (red). Cooler lights are better for tasks that require precision and focus, like reading or writing. Warmer lights are great for tasks that require more creative thinking, like brainstorming or designing.
Taking into consideration our previous article about circadian lighting design and the importance of colour temperature and lumen output to sleep and health, we can now consider another variable: the task at hand.
Warmer lights for a brainstorming session vs. colder lights for an account audit can be considered in the context of the time of day these activities are taking place. With modern lighting solutions, combining “tunable” LED lights that are networked to a control interface, all these considerations can be accounted for when programming lighting scenes, groups and light temperature throughout the day.
The end result? Creative teams that get more work done, are generally happier about it all and sleep well at night.
