When you want to elevate the atmosphere of any indoor setting you have, you can count on indoor lighting to do the job for you. Be it an office, a bedroom, a kitchen, or even a studio – indoor lighting will most certainly do the trick when it comes to giving your interior space a new “feel” that will definitely wow your visitors. Thing is, when you do want to shop for effective lighting, you might get overwhelmed with the many options available. After all, there are things such as track lighting vs recessed lighting, and what’s the difference between the two of them? This article will hopefully be able to help explain the difference between the two, and how you can use either of these to your advantage.
Light Makes All The Difference: Track And Recessed Lighting
If you’ve ever wanted to spend a bit more when it comes to home renovation, you’re not alone. In fact, younger homeowners are finding the idea of renovations quite attractive, as more of them – as well as first-time home buyers – take their time with their renovation needs.
For instance, millennial homeowners now spend as much as $60,400 when it comes to their home renovation needs. Meanwhile, first-time buyers average as much as $33,800 when it comes to the things they want to renovate at home.
It may help to understand what makes it confusing for people to choose between track and recessed lighting in the first place. This might be due to the fact that both of them are two (2) kinds of what’s called task lighting, which means they’re ideally used to illuminate an isolated and specific area of any indoor setting. While track and recessed lighting are used for this purpose, and while this makes them extremely similar to one another, they do make up completely different systems.
Track, Recessed Lighting: The Big Difference
With the above taken into consideration, it’s important to remember that both track lighting and recessed lighting can actually work for your interior design needs. It’s just that there really are specific instances where track lighting and recessed lighting can really work for your benefit. Providers such as Banno Lighting can help you when it comes to getting these lights for your needs, so it’s up to you to decide which of these lights you should use to maximize their benefits to you. Here are some of those ways:
Track Lighting: Hanging Lighting
Track lighting involves a narrow track that’s home to a series of arranged and hanging lamps. The track in itself is placed along a junction box, which then provides power to the lamps. Track lighting is attractive to others because of its flexibility, as there are three (3) known types. There’s the cable system, the monorail system, and the basic system. The cable system can be found more commonly in commercial buildings, as the lights are found in steel cables fixed along the ceiling like train tracks. Monorail systems involve tracks that hang a few inches just below the ceiling proper. Meanwhile, the basic track system is located directly on the ceiling itself.
- Flexibility can make track lighting an attractive option for homeowners. Since the lights themselves are found on the ceiling, adjustments and positioning can easily be done for any of the lamps.
- Multiple types make track lighting very good options for a variety of settings, such as beam ceilings, cement ceilings, concrete or even high ceilings.
- Decorating the lights themselves can be easy for track lighting. Given the right adapter, you can hang pendant lights from tracks, and they can be dropped a bit lower with a power extender and a stem.
- Complex installation requirements might turn off people from track systems. Track lighting, given their multiple varieties, have their own ways of installation. This may mean they can get a bit more complex to install than normal, given they have different requirements.
- Ease of installation might be a thing for track lighting, however. While it’s true that different track lighting systems need different requirements, installing the lights themselves are easy given they’re just attached to the ceiling.
- Cost-efficiency can be quite an attractive factor for track lighting, however, as they’re just directly mounted on the surface of the ceiling. This means it’s minimally invasive, and as such don’t need any adjustments to the structure of the area.
Recessed Lighting: Can Lighting
Recessed lighting is also called can lighting because of its effect once installed. These sets of lights are attached into the ceiling through hanger bars, and as a result create alternating sources of light along the area. Recessed lighting provides light according to its arrangement. Since the lights get mounted on the ceiling joists, there aren’t any hanging or visible light fixtures. However, the light itself may not always go along the ceiling itself. Sometimes, recessed lights will actually be found beneath the ceiling, similar to short cylinders.
- Subtlety is the best component of recessed lighting, because the light these produce can blend well with the ceiling.
- Decorations also stand out with recessed lighting, especially for pendants that can grab the center of attention for visitors.
- Recessed lighting works best with peaked, short, or sloped ceilings – giving owners a lot of flexibility and decorating options.
- Installation becomes easy for recessed lighting, because the light sources are just covered with drywall after being placed between the ceiling joists.
- Remodeling can make installation a bit of a drag, however. This is especially because structural remodeling may sometimes be needed to make sure the lighting properly blends with the intended area.
- Expenses with recessed lighting might not be friendly to the wallet, however. It’s not easy to do restructuring for ceilings just to accommodate recessed lighting requirements. This is especially due to the fact that ceilings in general aren’t built for recessed lighting.
The Takeaway: Choose The Right Lighting For Your Needs
When you plan on acquiring lighting for parts of your household, you’ve got to be careful so your lighting choice helps get your house to shine. This can get tricky at times, especially since not all home aesthetics are the same, and your tastes can be different than others. However, it’s important to understand that choosing between track lighting and recessed lighting is very much possible, especially if you know their key differences. With the tips above, you can access just what makes track lighting and recessed lighting work, and perhaps you can have a much more convenient time choosing the one that works best with your tastes.