Daylight plays a central role in our physical and mental wellbeing. We spend much of our days indoors, and whilst we may not have control of the lighting in our offices, we can make our homes a better environment where we enjoy more of the benefits of natural light.
If you are thinking about building an extension to your London property, then here are four tips to make the most of that precious natural resource.
Follow the sun
Depending on the orientation of your extension, there will be periods of the day when the room enjoys beautiful natural light and others when it may be darker. Therefore, to maximise natural light, it is always worth considering the orientation of a room when deciding on its purpose.
As any estate agent will tell you, a south-facing room is the prime orientation in terms of natural light. South-facing rooms will not see the sunrise or sunset, but they will benefit from natural light from morning until evening, and so almost any room will enjoy floods of natural light if it is south facing.
Meanwhile, east-facing rooms enjoy the best morning light, which makes them perfect for breakfast rooms, and west-facing rooms get the best evening light, which makes them perfect for entertaining.
North-facing rooms get the least light of all four orientations, but all is not lost if your extension is north facing. It just means that alongside any windows, it will also be worth considering a skylight or glass roof to get the best of the light.
Make use of skylights and glass roofing
Skylights are estimated to let in three times more natural light than traditional windows, which means that whatever the weather outside a skylight can brighten up almost any space.
Box-shaped extensions will benefit most from a pyramid-shaped skylight to fill the room with natural light. When the light shines into the prism, light is transferred down into the room at a wider angle, illuminating a wider area than other types of skylight. The shape also makes them better at deflecting the British rain, which is at least as common as sunshine!
Narrower rooms such as hallways or galley kitchens do not need to reflect light over such a wide area, and so would benefit most from a flat skylight, which can create dramatic illuminated strips of light as the sun moves across the sky.
One increasingly popular alternative to skylights in modern extensions is adding sections of glass roofing, which flood a room with natural light. These large glass panels can include a solar control coating to avoid a room feeling too much like a greenhouse in the summer and can make a huge impact to the feeling of light within an extension.
Choose glass room partitions
Glass is a great material for skylights and roofing, as well as for partition rooms, including the connection between an extension and the rest of a property. If you have built a new kitchen extension, complete with a section of glass roof that fills the room with light during the day, by using glass for the internal partition between the kitchen and the living room, both rooms can now benefit from the additional natural light.
Decorate to maximise brightness
Carefully placed mirrors can make better use of the natural light already coming into a room by reflecting it into other darker areas. For example, hanging a mirror opposite a window will enable it to reflect the maximum amount of natural light into a room. When hung in places such as above a fireplace, they can also make fantastic focal points within a room. Combine this reflected light with white walls, and you can make even the darkest rooms feel brighter and more airy.
If you are considering building an extension to your London home, then the experts at Good London Builders can help you from start to finish, from finding you the ideal architect to maximise natural light to the right builders to complete the job on time and within budget. Call us today on 0207 978 5097 or get in touch online.
