Landscape Lighting

You have just completed your beautiful new home and yard, all that is needed is some outdoor lighting to make your home look like Shangri-La as the sun goes down and increase the hours of enjoyment outdoors for you.

Low-voltage landscape lighting can create a mystic aura and enhance the aesthetic beauty of your property in wonderful ways. Focal points like special plants, trees with interesting bark structures, flowers and foliage should be lit with subdued and subtle lights while pathways, portions of the home, patios and decks need to complement the latter and create a collage of silhouettes and motifs. The best way to make the right choice is to look out of the window and decide which parts of your landscape need accents. Most outdoor lighting is put into place after construction is over and the garden has matured to a certain extent. It is of course possible to add, remove or enhance lighting to suit the dynamic nature of the outdoors. Lights along driveways and walkways sometimes need to be fitted before paving is complete, but be certain never to use very bright lights, which create a runway sort of effect. The aim of landscape lighting is always to generate an ambience rather than to simply illuminate, unless of course it is for security reasons.

With landscape lighting the challenge can be in not disrupting either the garden or other aspects of the home. Unless you are the do-it-yourself kind with some electrical skills, it is always better to call a professional to do the job. You don’t want to end up with lights that shine on windows, high contrast areas with spots of bright light and pitch dark peripheries, glares and excessively theatrical outcomes. Also, blown bulbs due to high voltage and short-circuits can increase costs.

Since it is the rule of thumb to use low-voltage lights for outdoor applications, the first step would be to install an all weather transformer to reduce voltage from 110 volts or 220 volts to approximately 12 volts. Low-voltage lights also have other benefits. They are smaller and can be easily hidden among foliage, they are cheaper to buy and install, and unlike hi-voltage wiring which needs to be passed through a conduit and then buried, low-voltage wiring can simply be stapled to the ground and covered by mulch or passed inside a slit in the lawn. The last step of course is the art of placing the fixtures in the appropriate place. A number of finishes are available with regard to fixtures, and homeowners can choose from copper, stainless steel and plastic. Generally, black or green fixtures tend to blend well with the surroundings.

Another interesting option for outdoor lighting is using solar-powered lights. They are environmentally friendly, easy to maintain, cheap and provide good illumination. There are two kinds of solar powered lights available – the stand-alone variety or ones which are connected by wire to a solar panel on the roof. Although the second type may be more expensive, the stand-alone varieties limit your creativity to a certain extent because they need to be placed in locations which receive a lot of sunlight during the day.

The choices are burgeoning day by day and the key to great landscape lighting is planning well in advance how you want the exterior of your home and the garden to look. Companies provide professional help, which could save you a lot of time and trouble. The different kinds of lighting available are also plenty and depending on your budget you could install a rudimentary system or go in for motion sensor lights, Italian lights which twine around trunks of trees or hanging lanterns which create a dazzling effect in your garden. Any way you go landscape lighting is a positive enhancement to any house.