The role of a lighting designer

"My house already has an architect and an interior designer, and the lighting shop advises for free — so why hire a lighting designer as well?" This is a question that deserves a straight answer.

How much does a lighting seller's free advice cost?

A lighting seller lives on the number of fixtures sold — their advice, however well-meaning, always ends at the catalogue of the brands they carry. The familiar result: a project with too many fixtures where they're easy to sell, and no solution where it's hard. An independent lighting designer charges a design fee and takes no commission on equipment — so they can advise you to cut ten downlights, something a seller will never say.

What a lighting designer actually does

A complete lighting dossier includes: a lighting concept based on the architecture and lifestyle; a layout drawing with the parameters of each light point (lumens, beam angle, colour temperature, CRI, UGR); illuminance calculations for each area; the circuit diagram and control scenes; equipment specification at several budget levels; and supervision — aiming and adjusting during installation. That last item matters more than people think: with the same fixture, aiming fifteen degrees wrong loses the whole effect of an accent.

Fixtures can be rebought, ceilings chiselled open and patched — but hardly anyone does. A mistake on paper is dozens of times cheaper than a mistake in the ceiling.

When you need one, and when you don't

Honestly: a standard small apartment may need only a good consultation rather than a full design contract. But villas, penthouses, houses with double-height voids, projects using many natural materials, and especially F&B — where light ties directly to revenue — there the lighting design fee is usually a small part of the fixture budget yet decides the effectiveness of all the rest. The most common cost of mistakes we see when clients come to "fix" a finished project: buying the fixtures a second time.

IDA Lighting works on a truly independent model: transparent package design fees, an equipment specification always offering options at several price levels, and you are entirely free to buy the fixtures anywhere — even not from us.