Recessed Lighting Installation in Portland, OR & the Metro Area

Recessed lighting laid out for the room and wired on a dimmer — housings chosen for what sits above the ceiling. We fit them across Portland, Beaverton, Tigard, and surrounding communities.

Recessed lights sit inside the ceiling, so the light comes from a housing above the drywall or plaster rather than from a fixture hanging below it. The housing is the part that matters. Where attic insulation will touch it, the housing must be IC-rated, which means it is built for insulation contact and will not overheat under a blanket of insulation. A non-IC housing needs clear space around it, and in a Portland attic that space rarely stays clear. We choose the housing after we look above the ceiling, not before.

There are two ways in. A new-construction housing fastens to the joists from above and suits an attic, a basement or any ceiling that is open for a remodel. A retrofit housing goes in from below through a cut hole and clips to the drywall, so a finished ceiling stays finished apart from the holes for the lights. Most jobs in an existing Portland house use retrofit housings on the main floor and new-construction housings where the attic gives us access. Layout comes first: we space the lights for the room, keep them off the joists, and put the kitchen ones over the counters rather than the walkway.

LED trims and dimmers have to match. An LED on the wrong dimmer flickers, hums or will not go all the way down, so we pair the trim with a dimmer built for it and test the low end before we leave. Adding recessed lights is new wiring, so we pull the permit and book the city inspection. In a house built before 1940 — 38.9% of Portland dwellings — we check what feeds the ceiling first; if the attic still runs on knob-and-tube, we talk about replacing that circuit before we add to it.