NEW, FREE GUIDE
You have a lighting plan. Here's how to get it installed properly.
Somewhere between the plan and the finished home, someone has to decide how high the wall lights go, which lights switch together, and where the driver for that pendant lives. If nobody decides before rough-in, your electrician decides on the day. This guide is how you get there first.
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This is for you if:
You have a lighting plan, from us or from anyone else, and you're managing the installation yourself
Your rough-in date is on the calendar and your electrician has started asking questions
You're about to buy fittings and want to know they'll do what the plan needs
You'd rather make the decisions now than on site with the trades waiting
This guide is about implementing a plan, not designing one. No plan yet? You need one before any of this applies. Ask us to design a lighting concept for your home, or if you’d rather do it yourself, start with our Design Guide and Light School Bundle to learn how to avoid a ceiling grid full of downlights.
What's inside:
Five pages. We wrote them because the same questions come up on nearly every home we design, usually about a fortnight before rough-in, or worse, at the electrical walkthrough with the build team.
Five Steps from Plan to Turning the Lights On
The order matters more than people expect. Three of the five steps have to be finished at least two weeks before rough-in, and one of them is the step most owners leave until the electrician asks.
The Checklist for buying fittings and briefing site
Thirteen things to confirm, seven before you buy a fitting and six before the cables go in. Some you'll know (colour temperature, wattage). Some you won't until you've been caught out. Designed to print and take with you.
What "it can't be done" is really telling you
It means one of three things, and only one of them means it can't be done. The guide tells you how to work out which you're hearing, and why an enthusiastic yes deserves the same caution.
What to do while the walls are still open
Three things we ask every client to do before the plaster goes on. None takes more than an afternoon, and one of them is the first thing you'll be glad of when you renovate again in ten years.
Why listen to us
MINT Lighting Design is an independent residential lighting design studio in Melbourne, working across Australia and internationally. Our approach has been refined over more than a decade and across 1,400+ residential lighting designs.
Our work has been featured in House & Garden, Grand Designs Magazine and on the Grand Designs television series, Sanctuary Magazine, Dream Homes Revealed, InsideOut and Home Beautiful, as editorial coverage rather than paid promotion.
We don’t sell light fittings. We’re brand agnostic, which means what we recommend gets chosen for your home rather than for a supplier relationship. It also means this guide has nothing to sell you.
GET THE FREE GUIDE
Free. No obligation. And if it looks like more than you want to take on in the busiest stretch of your build, call us and we'll talk through where we can help: (03) 9555 2275.