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The Best Bedside Lamps (for Better Sleep, Sex, and Ambiance)

Sex, reading, snoozing—everything is better by the glow of a great bedside lamp, from Japanese lanterns to glass mushroom lamps.
Best Bedside Lamp

If you’re reading this, you’re a hot person—no doubt about it. What’s not to love about the Carhartt beanie crowning your dome, or the the copy of The Will to Change under your armpit? Two Roman emperor thumbs way up, king. But there is one area in which you need some guidance, and it’s crucial in helping you read better, sleep better, and bone better in the new year. You need a swole new bedside lamp, and you need it STAT. 

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The best bedside lamps should bring warmth and relaxation to your daily bedchamber endeavors, from reading to romping to winding down for that REM cycle ride. (Overhead lights = reserved for hospitals and Target.) You deserve to live in a cozy Vermeer painting, or feel like a titmouse in its toasty woodland hovel, sipping an oat milk latte beside the glow of a Murano glass-inspired mushroom lamp while it rains outside. 

Whether you want a touch lamp, a Noguchi-esque lamp, or this saucy 80s Pierrot pondering his orb (!!), we’ve whittled down the best bedside lamps for every pleasure and price range. 

The best mushroom lamps 

The people have spoken, and declared that mushroom decor will continue to spore its swag all over 2023 design aesthetics. One of the most effortless and chic ways to incorporate a shroom’s curvaceous, ~organic~ silhouette into your home is with a 1970s Murano glass-inspired mushroom lamp; the glass gives off a gauzy, amber glow that’s perfect for reading and making out. 


$41.89 at Amazon

$41.89 at Amazon

Riffing on the OG Murano mushroom lamp design, West Elm’s ribbed glass table lamp is a unique take on the classic, and a consistent bestseller from the site; it comes in four different colorways, including three warmer shades and a calming, robin’s egg blue. 


$159 at West Elm

$159 at West Elm

Once you’ve experienced the joy of a cordless bedside lamp, it’s hard to go back to a life of dangling and tangling cords. This amber mushroom lamp is not only super affordable and cordless, but it can operate on a timer, which means you can waddle home from the bar with your boo for the night, and already have the lights dimmed to MacDaddy Swag-levels of romance.  

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$34.99 at Amazon

$34.99 at Amazon

This shroom lamp is a breeze. The cordless, a three-level touch lamp is a more contemporary-Japandi take on the OG mushroom lamp, and it’s so lightweight that one Amazon reviewer writes that it’s portable. “We took it outdoors a few times for dinner.” 


$35.99 at Amazon

$35.99 at Amazon

The Alien bedside lamp 

Think of the über popular Alien bedside lamp as a mushroom lamp with legs. It’s a bestseller on Amazon that has a little more height, which can be helpful if you want more direct/targeted light when your reading. 


$39.99 at Amazon

$39.99 at Amazon

The best Noguchi-inspired bedside lamps 

Isamu Noguchi’s iconic Akari paper lamps are having a design renaissance, because 1) they go with nearly EVERY kind of decor, whether you’re an MCM minimalist or a 70s maximalist, and 2) the rice paper shade gives off a uniquely ambient glow. We’ve whittled down our favorite Japanese rice paper and Noguchi-inspired lamps—or “light sculptures,” as Noguchi called them—in the VICE guide to Noguch’ lamps, but these two delicate nightstand blobs from Amazon deserve a dedicated  shoutout; they’re dead ringers for a piece by the late artist, and cost far less than this $2,500 archive Akari on 1stDibs.    


$42.59 at Amazon

$42.59 at Amazon

$24.99 at Amazon

$24.99 at Amazon

Cop an archive IKEA nightstand lamp 

If it’s divine design inspiration you seek, look no further than archive IKEA catalogs and Instagram accounts that pay homage to the GOAT of affordable Nordic decor. No shade to present-day IKEA, but the Swedish behemoth absolutely decimated the competition with minimalist designs that still managed to feel whimsical, such as these vintage cloud and mushroom lamps. 


$76.57 at Etsy

$76.57 at Etsy

$78.82 at Etsy

$78.82 at Etsy
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You can even find contemporary bedside IKEA lamps (including some Noguchi doppelgangers) on Amazon, such as this energy efficient Svallet lamp, for under $25. 


$22.99 at Amazon

$22.99 at Amazon

Pleats and squiggles (for more serotonin)

The culture has been edging Frasurbane decor ever since Y2K aesthetics came back in vogue, and 90s squiggle lamps are one of its best ambassadors. Many of the curvaceous lamps have pleated shades that we’re actually excited about (most lampshades = snooze city), and the Italian brand Oscar Piccolo even makes a stunning squiggly floor lamp. If you’re buying on a budget, peep sites such as Etsy and HAY for aesthetic options.


$245$208.25 at HAY

$245$208.25 at HAY

$380 at Etsy

$380 at Etsy

You’re a Brutalist bro

Maybe you dream about converting an old penny factory into a ceramics studio, or perhaps you’ve taken up weaving to make yourself a new, monochromatic capsule wardrobe. If so, congrats: you’re probably a Brotalist, and your patron saint, Ricardo Bofill, would likely approve of this stately marble bedside lamp from West Elm


$159 at West Elm

$159 at West Elm

Warm things up with rattan

Here’s what you do: Put a Brutalist lamp in one color so people know you’re a creative and a tough guy, and a wood or rattan lamp in another corner so they know you want forehead kisses. This woven bamboo lamp looks like it costs thrice as much as its roughly $30 price tag, and will pair perfectly with just about anything.


$32.99 at Amazon

$32.99 at Amazon

Stay cozy, kings. 


The Rec Room staff independently selected all of the stuff featured in this story. Want more reviews, recommendations, and red-hot deals? Sign up for our newsletter.