Lighting is an important feature for the interior of a room as it produces a good state of mind, atmosphere, and beautiful appeal in living space. Light and lighting fixture create a pleasant and safe habitat besides adding style to the interior of a room. Moreover, as lighting consumes nearly 35% of the total electricity consumed in a building, LED drivers are proposed to increase energy efficiency. Lighting design is mandatory for the placement of lights to have good illumination, thereby lighting design is done for a two-bedded hostel room with fluorescent and LED lights and their performance is analyzed. A phase-shifted buck converter (PSBC) LED driver is designed and experimented for 24 and 6 W to retrofit the existing fluorescent lights in the two-bedded room. The results show that the output lumens and efficiency of PSBC LED driver are higher than conventional LED driver (CBC). Based on the PSBC experimental results, a lighting design is done using DIALux software for the existing room with fluorescent lights and a retrofitted room using PSBC and LED lights. The simulation results show that PSBC driver provides good illumination and has better energy savings. The estimated installation cost, energy savings, and energy efficiency for the PSBC driver and a conventional buck driver also prove that PSBC driver is a better alternative for energy savings. © Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd 2020.