Lights are something so fundamental in the house. We did quite spend a while on it because we had to figure out the type of style we were going for. Our first stop was Like Lights and speaking to Jonas was truly enlightening (no pun intended). We learnt so much about lightings and shadows. I like that he was honest and don't hard-sell/ over-sell.
I am an overly-excessive person (I admit), and Jonas managed to knock some sense into me, otherwise my scandinavian house would look absolutely cluttered with me dumping statement lights at every opportunity. We have learnt that for flats, the usual place to put a statement piece is the dining area and entrance. For bigger homes, the grander lights was always placed at areas where the guests visit. Don't be surprised, but this includes the guest toilet. Hahah!
Light shops ain't the most convenient for me. However, my advise for homeowners is still to make the trip down. Just looking through photos isn't going to help. You would also need to allocate a few hours at the shop when choosing for statement pieces. Like Lights is only the size of a slightly bigger bedroom but every space had hanging lights and there was a lot to see.
One thing I really like about the lights there was that the base for most of the design was pretty much the same. In future, if I want to shake things up a little, I can buy a new cover and the lights in my house would have a new look! It also helped that Jonas was very helpful in mixing and matching the colours so that the piece we choose would best suit our house theme. For all his time and service, he charged very reasonably for our choice at about $200+.
The Hubs had a love at first sight with one of the pieces. It is a very simple design but it made quite a statement with our guests. In fact, many people asked where it was from. We didn't choose to go for smartbulbs because my Hubs is not into a smart home (I am into it though). Jonas suggested trying out 3-tones light bulbs instead, which I have to admit this is perfect for couples who are on 2 opposite ends of the spectrum.
So basically, you can use your current switch (no need for a dimmer) and obtain 3 different light settings. One setting is really dim for ambience, the other 2 is good enough for reading and working from home. The only con is that you can't pick the setting, you would have to turn it on and off if you wanna skip from tone 1 to tone 3, just can't skip tone 2. From what I have heard, the bulbs spoil faster as compared to the one-tone bulb. It has been about 4 months and so far the lights are still working well!
For the rest of the house, we used basic lights. Like Lights don't do basic lights. We went to Three Cubes for the rest of our lights because of the good reviews we recieved from 2 different sets of friends. Similarly, I find these guys know their stuff and offer very good advise. Our ID asked us to get really high watts lights but these guys told us no need and we followed their advise and saved quite a bit.
The chaps were also very flexible and allowed me to make changes to my orders. We got the track lightings and normal LED lights from them. I would say they don't have that much designs in terms of variety but it works :D