While most of us would love to work in a spacious office with lots of windows around that allow natural light, unfortunately, we get stuck in working at windowless offices and cubicles. However, commercial painting services in San Jose include will turn your dark, dingy and windowless offices into more agreeable-looking spaces by some painting and design tricks that will give the illusion of daylight.
1. Choose a new paint color
One of the best and most effective ways to brighten up a dark, windowless room is to change the paint colors on the walls.
It is actually counter-productive to use stark, solid white for the walls unless your working area is a hospital, a clinic, a school, a doctor’s office or a laboratory. If you use solid, bright white in a windowless room, it will end up looking flat, cold, and lifeless when hit by artificial light. Stark white may even appear darker if you choose the wrong lighting.
Go for the other shades of white such as beige, cream white, peach, Navajo white or powdery blues, soft pinks or lighter shades of yellow. These colors will help open your office space and inject a sense of warmth into it.
If you use one color for the entire room – including the ceiling – the lines and edges will disappear, and the claustrophobic atmosphere will float away. This will create a more flowing, seamless and open look to your office space.
2. Install a large mirror
Unless you want to change the structure of your office space, there is not much you can do to its actual dimensions. But you can create an illusion of an illuminated and expanded space by adding a large mirror. Not only does it simulate a large window, but it can also add a sense of depth and make the space appear bigger and wider. A large mirror also bounces some of the indoor light, making your office space look brighter and feel warmer.
3. Use glass doors or French doors
Glass doors are typical sights in the office. They also double as some sort of a window which gives you the sense of peering out into space outside, even if it is just an ordinary corridor that leads to your office. It also allows the surrounding light into your office space. If you want some privacy though, you can go for glass windows with a strategically placed frosting (another good alternative is using French doors).
4. Add some natural elements to your office space
There are benefits of adding plants to your office space – they help in reducing stress, boosting productivity and cleaning and purifying indoor air, among many others. But when you deal with an utter lack of natural light, choose low-maintenance indoor plants that do not require lots of sunlight and will do well in low-light areas such as snake plant, spider plant, bamboo palm and succulents like cacti and Aloe Vera, as well as different varieties of ferns.
5. Disperse light evenly
Dealing with a windowless office, it is essential to disperse light evenly. One of the best ways is to have pot lights or overhead lights evenly spaced throughout the ceiling. To make the area even brighter, add lights to hidden areas – tuck in small lamps under furniture pieces or behind shelves to create more light. You can also use recessed floor lights to illuminate darkened office aisles.
Designing and decorating an office space without windows will pose certain challenges, and it certainly calls for professional help. You cannot go wrong with the best commercial painting services in San Jose to turn your windowless offices into bright and open spaces that will help in boosting your mood, professional attitude, creativity and productivity.