The landscape lighting movement has seemingly spread as fast as light itself in recent decades to the extent that it’s no longer a movement–it’s an expectation. Back in the ’90s, when weekends were scheduled around 2-night Blockbuster rentals and American Idol was just another nickname for Steven Seagal, homeowners could set safety standards with a few motion-sensor flood lights and call it a day. Now, with so many lighting fixtures, colors, bulb types, and cutting-edge advancements revolutionizing the game, outdoor lighting has evolved into an industry of stylized security. Bringing your own unique flair to your backyard is both achievable and affordable with these outdoor lighting ideas.
Landscape Lighting Tips to Bring Your Indoors Outdoors
Defiance to live strictly within the walls of a house is a wildfire trend. From deck lights to path lights, landscape lighting can provide the seamless house-to-yard transition you need to create the perfect outdoor living space for you, your family, and your guests. Brightness and color control features, fixture sizes, and beam angle options allow you to fulfill your desired ambiance. The front yard sets the impression for neighbors and passersby, but the backyard is for you the homeowner. It’s an extension of your indoor living space–so let’s give it some life.
Elevate Safety and Style with Path Lights
Along with generating visual interest, pathway lighting ensures safe travel along walking paths that run through your garden features, day or night. However, classic path lights aren’t limited to just lighting walkways since they complement all architectural themes. Because of their versatility, they can bring notes of allure to dimly lit and/or underappreciated pockets of your yard.
If your property includes a structure detached from the main house–shed, casita, pergola–chances are you have a walkway connecting the house to the additional structure. A backyard pathway that lacks proper illumination is a stone’s throw from an impending accident. Take this opportunity to line the pathway with the welcoming glow of equally spaced lighting. For effective illumination, we recommend spacing the lights 5 to 8 feet apart. To enhance aesthetics further, flank the pathway with limestone or plants then contain the new addition with plastic or natural edging. While walkways are mostly used for function, appreciating beauty along the way can be a rewarding treat for the eyes. Running a garden of glow along the walkway also reduces the vulnerability factor.
Directional path lights are great for above-grade applications that feature an inclined path of stone steps. Using traditional path lights for this application would present a visible glare from the fixtures. With directional path lights, the glare is limited because the light can be adjusted to shield the light from our eyes, giving you control of the lighting effect.
Dazzle with Deckor
When the sun calls it quits, deck lights help create an ideal space to bask under the stars or offer a lively ambiance for social gatherings. Flexible and energy-efficient, deck lights have the capacity to create a whole new outdoor room as well as reduce the risk of impromptu visits to the emergency room from trips and falls.
Step up Safety Standards
Bringing safety and sophistication to your landscape with the right deck step lights is easier than you might imagine. Designed to withstand harmful elements, including foot traffic, low voltage step lights provide a dramatic effect while offering a warm and inviting path of light. Lighting Warehouse has a variety of mount-ready models in a wide range of designs that are a breeze to install and flush with the natural tones of your outdoors.
These step lights can also be installed as a recessed lights designed for concrete pour applications, meaning they can be used for alternative spaces like retaining walls or built-in to other backyard landscape features like a fire pit, column, or outdoor kitchen.
Color Yourself Impressed
If your path is flanked by flowerbeds, opt for a lighting fixture solution that will complement the colors. For instance, a copper path light’s warm tone offsets a bed of regally purple lavender irises, verdant green foliage, or other hot-toned blooms, generating texturized visual seduction.
Color-changing lamps accent your patio, deck, or lanai with a unique and personalized touch. Impress guests with a color changing spotlight or flood light that features warm white color temperature and color modes that can be controlled with a remote or with your Smartphone.
Get in Tune with In-Ground Well Lights
Perfect for illuminating trees, columns, and walls, in-ground well lights don’t just show up to work–they put in overtime. Well lights are typically circle-shaped fixtures that are installed directly into the ground, though they come in a variety of shapes and styles. Available in lamp-set and integrated LED models, well lights have water-resistant and weather-resistant features that enable proficiency when submerged underwater, making them beneficial in environments that are accustomed to flooding.
Leveraging well lights’ water-friendly advantage for poolside pleasure is a promising course of action. By simply encircling your pool’s perimeter with recessed lights, you can transform your backyard into an all-inclusive resort. If you’re in the 90% of the population lacking a residential swimming pool–no problem! These in-ground game changers can instill enhanced safety and charm to fountains, waterwalls, and other aquatic features throughout your yard.
Accent Your Ambiance
Like path lights but with even more versatility, accent lights are regularly used for uplighting and downlighting applications. Typically packaged with mounting accessories, they can be easily installed on the beams and rafters of a lanai, deck, or pergola.
Accent lighting can also be used to amp up security. Spacing accent spotlights along the base of a fence not only delivers a refreshing lighting effect but also defends your backyard from unwanted intruders or animals. Many accent lights come with sconce and beam angle options that allow you to further assert your creative juices.
Whether you want to create a relaxing oasis or a lively entertainment scene, it’s important to remember three things: prioritize light effect over fixtures, consider the variables involved around the path, and don’t be afraid to get creative.
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