- Does this room adequately provide me with the ability to achieve the function it was designed for?
- Does this living room transform from entertaining to relaxation?
- Do I feel good spending time in this space?
- Am I enjoying all of this rooms architectural features?

These are only a few questions we should ask ourselves upon entering a space. Often we feel if we furnish our palace with the very best furnishings, we will answer positively to the above questions. However, although furnishings and accessories play a role in answering, "yes" to these questions; your answer truly will not be "yes" unless the intangible aspects of the space are given the necessary attention. These intangible aspects are such things as atmosphere, practicality, mood, and feeling.

Good lighting and lighting design is a key element in achieving the environment you strive to attain. Light gives a room its mood and comfort. Good lighting sheds a glow, highlights key elements, enables us to perform tasks properly and, most importantly, makes us feel good.

Lighting can make smaller spaces feel larger and larger spaces feel more intimate. It can make galleries out of long narrow hallways. It can make architectural features become focal points. It can transform dining spaces into points of interest.

For these reasons, good lighting should be designed. The composition consisting of the three basic types of lighting:

1. Task lighting - lighting to perform a task, such as cooking or reading.
2. Ambient lighting - the overall lighting of the space.
3. Accent lighting - lighting to highlight specific points of interest.

Combining different types of lighting to create direct and indirect lighting is what gives a space its interest and flexibility. Only when a space has proper dramatic down-lighting and soft diffused indirect lighting is the space able to obtain the needed differentiation and texture that creates interesting and comfortable illumination, hence, bringing you to the point where all the initial questions would be answered with an undeniable "yes".

Mancini Associates stands for quality lighting design and will provide you with all the necessary ingredients for a pleasant atmosphere where your mood and feelings will be satisfied but practicality will not be sacrificed.

Mancini Fine Lighting and Design,
Located in East Greenwich, Rhode Island.
2007 © Jennifer Sullivan and Mancini Fine Lighting