At MINT the key focus in our lighting design for a passive house - is to minimise energy consumption throughout the home….this is achieved by effective selection of LED luminaires [light fittings], and by avoiding downlights and recessed lighting - WHY’s that?…so as not to impact on the building envelope and reduce the thermal integrity of the home.

Lighting for artworks requires a little more attention that simply putting a downlight, or even a gimble downlight near it in the ceiling.

There is no one-size fits all solution – that said, we have a few nifty tricks to share with you that will work in 90% of situations – and we can leave the last 10% for art galleries who have both the budget and the reason to go the extra mile.

Put out the welcome mat with lighting....

Whether your home is Modern or Traditional in style, the lighting at your entrance will define how you feel every day that you come home after dark. You can choose to create dramatic lighting effects, or soft voluminous light, both can work beautifully - just don't leave it to the last minute and end up with a single downlight, or oyster at the front door and cheap BBQ lights around the perimeter of your home. You deserve so much more.

Lighting for outdoor living is completely different to lighting indoors. You don't want to be blasted with light - you want to get a sense of the entire space, and enjoy sitting in gentle light that inspires hours of conversation with friends and family.

Adele Locke, founder of MINT Lighting Design is changing the way people consider illumination for their next residential projects. Working directly with the homeowners, builders or architects and interior designers, she is transforming the way light is treated in our homes. We caught up with her recently to find out more about her game changing work.

Creating two completely unique lighting solutions to mirror image townhouses, gave the MINT team a fantastic opportunity to explore the variety of lighting solutions that bring that special WOW factor to any home.

MINT has been collaborating with Hallbury Homes for the last 12 months to bring our beautiful and unique approach to lighting design to their bespoke luxury builds.We’re bringing transformational light to homes of all shapes and sizes, changing Australian Homes for good.

It might be the smallest room in the house – but it’s one of the most vital to our comfort. It’s also a room that everyone goes to every day – usually many times!

Truly, in such a small room, regardless of colour and anything else going on, you really don’t need much light at all – so you can really go wild – let your freak flag fly!

The temptation when designing a dining room (or more often these days, a dining zone within your open living space) is to make the lighting pendant the feature of the space, for your WOW piece - that amazing pendant that makes your heart sing! We're all for that of course - but the greater question is how to bring the flexibility in - without losing the delight of the dramatic.

Oversize pendants are fantastic for creating a human scale in a large space, and usually, industrial style is used in large spaces to break them up and give them personality. So think BIG when choosing your pendants - and with all those hard surfaces, think fabric too - it'll help control the noise levels in your exposed brick/concrete room.

At the other end of the spectrum we find these magnificent light art installations, sometimes created for a special event, and in some commercial projects, fibreoptics are used to create amazing, dramatic interactive experiences for people.

Share your opinion below - and if you're not sure what you think...read on and let's explore it together.