Planning the lighting your salon can be broken down to a few simple rules for different areas of your salon. To plan proper lighting, you must understand three terms, kelvin, lux and lumens. It’s easy. Kelvin is the ‘color temperature’ of light. A low number like 2700K is yellowish-red, which is like the standard light bulb we grew up with. A high number like 5000K is bluish light, like you see in an office building.
Make sure you use 3500 Kelvin lights to light your client’s hair. LED lights are far better than other lights because its spectral power closely mimics the sun’s. An hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset, the light outside is about 3500K – this is the considered the golden hour for photography, due to the perfect color temperature of the light.
2700-3000K is ideal for lighting your client’s face. Their complexion will look like they have a slight tan. 3000K is preferred. Higher Kelvin light is not flattering for the skin.
Lumens and lux refer to the amount of light.
Plan your salon lighting to have:
To achieve this, a simple method is used to calculate your lighting requirements in lumens (see below). To calculate the lighting needed for the overall lighting for your salon, determine the total square footage of your space. Then multiply that by 50 lumens per sq foot to get the total lumens needed. Bulbs will specify how many lumens each bulb has. Get enough bulbs to total that many lumens. For example:
Your cutting station should need a lot more light, (100 to 150 lumens per sq foot; 1000 – 1500 lux).
Remember that the further away your lights are, the more the light spreads out. Typically
If you have dark walls, you should add a little more light because the dark walls will absorb light rather than reflect it. Wall color is also an important consideration in a salon because if your walls were, let’s say, red, your reflected light off the walls would be giving unwanted red tones. Remember every light you buy will tell you how many lumens it is and most will tell you the kelvins.
Plan your salon with:
CRI is the Color Rendering Index. Knowing a bulb’s CRI will enable you to pick one that shows true hair color.
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