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Lighting is an important fashion accessory in any house, and just like fashion, it is changing all the time. For a lot of homeowners, it’s important to keep up with current styles in lighting so that their home can look designer, but with more variety in the industry now than ever before, it can be hard to decide where to start. These trends in lighting will brighten up your style (and your house).

1. LED Edison Bulbs

Go for an authentic look with an LED Edison bulb. Traditional Edison bulbs are not very bright, but the industry is flipping the switch on that. “Now you can get the best of both worlds with LED bulbs. They last longer, give you light and still get a decorative look,” says Holly Gambsky of Northtown Lighting in Appleton. The warm color these lights emit will give any room an old-fashioned glow.

2. Oversized Fixtures

Have a kitchen island that could use some sprucing up? Try making it a focal point with a couple oversized fixtures. “People used to do, say, three small pendants over an island, but now people will do two oversized pendants,” says Erin Lenius, a lighting designer and consultant at Lighting by Design in Appleton. This makes the island as much a space to show off as the dining room.

3. Mixed Metallic Finishes

This trend has two applications – varying the finishes throughout the house and varying the finishes within one piece itself. “When building homes 20 years ago, people tended to stay with the same finish throughout the entire home. Currently, people use different finishes throughout the home, even in the same room as long as they still complement each other,” says Gambsky. This trend led to using multiple finishes on one fixture. Right now, soft golds that are a mix of gold, silver and bronze finishes are popular. Often these finishes will have a brushed look to them, instead of a solid color. Another popular combo that you might find is bronze and brushed nickel.

4. Locally Made Fixtures

As Cassidy Evers at Peerless Design Studio LLC in Appleton says, buyers want lights that are custom-made; the more unique the better. It can be hard to find those unique light fixtures that perfectly fit your home, but looking local can be one of the best things for a buyer to do to get that one-of-a-kind piece. A handcrafted porcelain pendant from Peerless can add a distinctive flare to your kitchen. Such a pendant with sleek lines, fewer curls and less “fluff” is also trendy, according to Gambsky.

5. Artful Pieces

As buying local and the demand for the unique picks up, so does the craftiness of fixtures. “Lighting can be a piece of art now,” Lenius says. Whether it’s handcrafted fixtures made of mercury glass, blown glass, birch wood or upcycled kitchen appliances from Red Door Mercantile in Neenah, lighting is becoming art and the industry is picking up on that. “The continuous ebb and flow of design is always making new out of the old,” Lenius says, but art is timeless.

—FC