Hello Ranarp and Hektar!

I’m so excited to introduce you to my little friends, Ranarp and Hektar! Those would be lamps. IKEA has a way with the names. Anyway, I have a thing with lighting. It’s my jam. It’s the little detail that I fall in love with when I pour through magazines or blogs. Specifically, little accent lighting.

When the Bub and I took a last minute trip to Cincinnati one Saturday a few weeks ago, these were on my list. Well, actually, another lamp was on my list but IKEA has gone to LED lights only so they didn’t carry the one I wanted anymore. I was hoping to do two of the one I showed you here on the shelves in our kitchen.

Since they no longer sell those I had to find another option. I started to go with the LED version but by the time you get all their connectors, the great IKEA prices aren’t so great anymore. It was going to cost $100 for two little lights!

So we kept looking and I’m glad we did! I’ve seen this guy (that would be Ranarp, hello) here and there on the Internets and have loved the look. He’s a little industrial, but with a classic vibe that goes in a more traditional setting too. He was perfect:

Don’t you love the black and white cord? Details I love. 

This spot has been a black hole in our kitchen and I’ve been wanting to add just a little bit of light to it for months. Ranarp fits just right. It comes with a bracket so you can hang it on the wall too, but I just clamped it on the top shelf of the bookcase. You can tighten it so it stays put.

It looks good and it works great too – this is the one light I turn on every evening without fail:

I did some finagling to make the cord disappear cause you know how they make me itch. I’ll paint those cord covers gray soon – it just hasn’t been a priority yet:

The rest of the cord, as cute as it is, is in a cord cover that goes down the back of the bookshelf:

It works like a charm! Now I wish I would have gotten two more of these lamps to put in the Bub’s bedroom – next trip for sure.

I grabbed a couple of the Hektar lamps too, for a spot in loft eventually. But I found an area that was needing some light instead:

We had a bunch of recessed lights added to the family room when we knocked down the wall, but I wish we would have pushed them back just a bit more down on this end of the room. It can get a little dark down there.

It still needed a little bit of task lighting and this lamp is perfect!:

I hid the cord along the side of the board and batten and you don’t even notice it. And yes, I’m planning on painting the switch white, but again, haven’t gotten to it just yet.

This one pivots and turns and can be adjusted any way that you want:

I think these little accents are what add some character to your home without breaking the bank. I LOVE you Hektar and Ranarp!:

They are both listed at $20 each online, but one of them (I think the white one) was only $15 in the store.

The only pain about these lamps is the light bulbs…argh!!! If you get them at IKEA don’t forget the light bulbs. I totally spaced it on that and left without them, and I know better by now. Some IKEA lights take very specific bulbs. The problem is, they are supposed to take LED which is crazy expensive. I’m not a big LED light fan -- it’s so white and bright and they cost a ton. I found the bulb for the Ranarp lamp at Lowe’s but it cost more than the lamp! I mean, it will last us something like 20 years, granted. But still…that’s a hard pill to swallow.

I still can’t find the LED bulb for the darker one, the Hektar, so I picked up a 25 watt flood light bulb and it works great. Because the wattage is low it’s fine with this lamp – which didn’t occur to me until I had bought FOUR bulbs in an effort to find one that fit the dang lamp! Curses. Thankfully Lowe’s lets you return them. :)

Anyway, here’s what I used – the LED on the left is for the white Ranarp lamp and the one on the right is the one I used in the black Hektar:

Maybe that will help some of you looking – it wasn’t easy to find ones that work!

I’m scoping out other areas of the house that would be a good fit for more small task lighting like these. Like I said, I’ll be adding two of the white lamps to the kiddo’s room soon. I think they’ll look so good in there. Just have to come up with another excuse to drive to Cincinnati. ;)

Have you used these lamps anywhere in your home? I didn’t realize till I looked them up online that there’s a whole series of products in each one – I LOVE the Ranarp pendant light!