Spotted: all of the most stylish living rooms have this one nostalgic lighting staple in common right now

The '60s and '70s carried a serious sense of swank. Interiors didn’t beg for attention, they just were, inherently, incredibly chic. Silhouettes lounged low and unbothered. Palettes smoldered. Wood was deep and moody – as were the vinyls probably spinning somewhere in the background. But the lesser-praised force holding it all together? Lighting ideas. And since design legends like Charles Sevigny definitely weren’t flipping on the ‘big light,' what exactly was their secret? Why did these interior spaces look so moody, so good?

According to designers, it's because these icons layered. With floor lamps.

‘Floor lamps are having a revival because people are craving and exploring how to properly layer lighting,’ says South Carolina-based interior designer Cortney Bishop. Filled with clean, intentional forms and materials like brass, veiny marble, and richly grained wood, the lighting trends we’re seeing right now feel like a time capsule – in a really great way.

Just look at CB2’s latest luminaries, which feature barely-there arc silhouettes juxtaposed against oversized shades and a dramatic sense of scale.

The retro influence is also clear in Cortney Bishop’s own collaboration with Hudson Valley Lighting, too. The Bohicket floor lamp, for instance, features warm brass wrapped in natural woven rattan, topped with an unpretentious linen shade. Floor lamps, Cortney says, are increasingly becoming 'statement pieces in their own right – function meeting sculpture.’

They also pull a neat little interior design trick: floor lamps make rooms look bigger. ‘They draw the eye up and add illumination at height while taking up minimal floor space,’ explains Industville founder Mara Rypacek Miller. It’s why designers love them for nooks, corners, and textured wall moments.

You can’t really botch the styling of a well-chosen floor lamp – even two, if they share a finish or shape. But every designer I interviewed did flag one living room lighting mistake in particular: scale.

Which is also the catch-22. Floor lamps are sizing up for 2025 and beyond – amazing and avant-garde, until it’s not. ‘Either too tall for the ceiling height or with a shade that dwarfs the furniture around it,’ explains Terri Brien, principal designer of her eponymous firm in Southern California. ‘A floor lamp should feel integrated into the space, not like it wandered in from another room and was just plopped down as an afterthought.’

It's important to note that floor lamps operate, quite literally, on a different level than table lamps. ‘A floor lamp carries presence in a way a table lamp simply can’t,’ says designer Cortney Bishop. ‘They anchor a corner, frame a sofa, or balance a tall bookshelf. They live in the architecture of the room, not just on a surface, and that shifts the entire conversation.’

Maybe it’s the years of Mad Men reruns talking, but I’ve always admired that era’s barely-there bravado – the things said over cocktails, the sharp corners of a sunken living room, the laissez-faire lighting that never tried too hard. With the right floor lamp, a little of that mid-century swagger lives on in 2025.

Ahead, six floor lamps we’d love to see in the mix.

Learn how to master the glow your living room deserves with our guide on, what is lampscaping – the art of lighting like a true design professional.