Tasteful Interiors - low ceilings?

Just got through admiring some of the wonderful posts in 'Tasteful Interiors'. Some really beautiful photos there. Some not to my taste, but all stunners.

http://www.styleforum.net/t/302740/tasteful-interiors/0_20

A main feature is high ceilings.

Can anyone post tasteful interiors with low ceilings? Ceilings no higher than eight feet.

I would post some, but I can't find any.

Low ceiling

Before:



After:

wow that looks sick!

how did you manage to change that wall into a window?

Doh!

I can't tell you. Ummm. Magic!



flambard said:

Can anyone post tasteful interiors with low ceilings?

Click to expand...

No.

Model 45 chair....nice!

Obviously the problem with low ceilings is that light can't reach the back of the room as easily, so most well designed spaces with low ceilings are either very small and intimate which focus towards framed exterior views (like traditional Japanese interiors), or very dark and cavernous, and artificially lit with careful consideration to well-blended contrasts. Generally, most of the "tasteful" ones will use darker materials like stained woods or such, because they handle drastic variance between illuminated and shadowed tones, unlike white plasters or other light-colored materials that need the consistency of abundant lighting that higher ceilings and large windows provide. You almost have to work within the mindset of trying recreate a Caravaggio painting's chiaroscuro effects if you want to pull off a low ceiling space in most cases. Wright's Robie House and other early Prairie Style houses of his are some of the few spaces that deliberately use low ceilings for a reason other than thrift and they have that same kind of lighting strategy. The general thinking in Wright's case is that the low ceilings accentuated the horizontality of the suburban home's spaciousness, in contrast to urban homes that required verticality, so the low ceilings would sort of "pull" you towards the edges of the houses where the sitting rooms were. Greene & Greene's Gamble House is another good example of that strategy. But either way, low spaces need "regimental" lighting so your darks and lights are well balanced, combined with earthly materials that take well to artificial light's colors.

laymans perspective:
low ceilings have some intrinsic advantages, cheaper, and more efficient (less volume to HVAC), and they can feel very comfortable or 'cozy'
I agree, lighting design is much more critical with a low ceiling, or the room can look 'cave like', and it has to be integrated/consistent/even distributed, I would avoid hanging or surface fixtures, make it flush or low profile
also, imo you want large openings, the entrance ways from other rooms should be wide and no doors (bedrooms obviously excepted), to open it up. make it feel less constricted
glass/windows, lots of it, floor to ceiling is nice, maybe a whole wall


my main room clgs are 8'', but it has 3 large openings (~6'W x 7' H, main entry, kitchen, backyard) and 1 long wall 70% glass, 1 short ~50%, all lighting is recess except for 1 fixture over a table

Hi...

I'm an independent filmmaker currently looking for locations...That last Japanese interior in your post...Do you by any chance know where that photo was taken?

Would you know any areas similar to that out in Southern California?

It's a standard Japanese tea room. You could build one from scratch on Harvey Weinstein's tennis court pretty easily, but you're in luck, because the Huntington Library in San Marino, CA has one in their Japanese botanical garden.