Floor Lamps for Dark Corners & Flexible Lighting
Some rooms have one ceiling light and nothing else. Some have a layout where the sofa ends up nowhere near a socket, or a reading chair that's perfectly positioned apart from the fact that there's no useful light within three metres of it. A floor lamp is the answer to all of those situations — it plugs in, stands where you need it, and moves when your arrangement changes.
There's no installation, no drilling, no committing to a position you might want to change in six months. The pieces in this collection range from slim arc designs that reach over a sofa to simple upright lamps for corners that just need filling. What they share is a footprint small enough to place almost anywhere and a light quality that does something a ceiling fixture at full brightness never quite manages — makes a room feel worth being in after dark.
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Best Placements in Real Homes
The corner behind a reading chair is the most straightforward case: a floor lamp positioned just behind and to the side of the chair brings the light down to exactly the right level without shining directly in your eyes. It makes the corner feel purposeful rather than incidental, and the chair actually gets used in the evenings. That shift — from furniture that's notionally there to furniture that functions — is what a well-placed floor lamp reliably produces.
Behind or beside a sofa is the other high-return position. Most living rooms have a sofa pushed against a wall with a ceiling light somewhere above the centre of the room, which means the seating area is lit from above and behind rather than at any useful angle. A floor lamp at one or both ends of the sofa changes that. It also creates a visual boundary that makes the seating arrangement feel like a defined zone rather than furniture that happens to be in the same room.
For rooms without any overhead lighting — common in older UK flats and some period conversions — a floor lamp isn't a supplement to the ceiling light, it is the ceiling light. In that situation, two or three floor lamps placed at different points around the room will do a more effective job than one lamp trying to compensate for the absence of a central fixture.
Floor Lamps vs Table Lamps — Which One Does Your Room Need
The practical difference comes down to surface space and position flexibility. A table lamp needs something to sit on — a sideboard, a bedside table, a shelf — which anchors it to wherever that furniture happens to be. A floor lamp needs only a socket and a few square centimetres of floor space, which means it can go places a table lamp simply can't: behind a sofa, in a corner with no furniture, beside an armchair that has no table next to it.
Height is the other distinction. A floor lamp throws light from a higher point than most table lamps, which suits living rooms and open spaces where you want a broader spread of light across the room. Table lamps sit at a lower level and produce a more contained, intimate pool — better for bedside use and surfaces where you want the light to stay local. The two aren't in competition; in a well-lit room you'll often find both, doing different jobs at different heights. If you're choosing between them for a specific spot, ask which one can actually reach that spot — and that usually settles it.
Choosing the Right Height and Footprint
Most floor lamps fall between 140cm and 180cm tall, and within that range the choice is largely about proportion and use. A taller lamp — 160cm and above — works well in rooms with higher ceilings or wherever you want the light source to sit above eye level and wash down across the room. Shorter designs, or those with an adjustable head, suit reading positions where you want to direct light at a specific angle rather than fill the room generally.
Footprint is where people occasionally get caught out. The base of a floor lamp can be wider than it looks in product photography, particularly on heavier arc designs where a broad, weighted base is what stops the lamp toppling when extended. Before ordering, check the base dimensions on the product page and measure the floor space you're working with — particularly if the lamp is going in a corner or beside furniture where clearance is limited. As a general rule, anything with a base under 30cm in diameter will sit comfortably in most positions without demanding space the room doesn't have.