Outdoor lighting will revitalize your outdoor garden scheme. The great outdoors offers up so much, from breathtaking views to relaxing naps, but if you're going to make the most of this amazing world around you, it's time to add some beautiful, stylish outdoor lighting to your landscaping.
If you have backyard ideas, you’re going to love these garden lighting ideas. They transform what was previously a black space into a magical landscape, full of color, light beams and effects, whilst also providing safe passage down steps and along pathways.
8 Ways to do Outdoor Lighting:
Create outdoor lighting that is going to set your home apart from the others. Use the same approach to designing your outdoor lighting as you do for your interior lighting. Consider the elements of your backyard that you want to highlight and also look at the areas of your backyard that you need to highlight, in order to make it more attractive and functional.
Together these two elements will establish the basis of your outdoor lighting design.
- If you want to make sure your outside lighting gives you the look you desire, you must also consider how it looks when viewed through your windows. Outdoor lighting ideas give you a stunning visit to enjoy whatever the weather – lighting the front yard is different from lighting the back. Front porch lighting is for your enjoyment, and also for your neighbors, if you want to create a coordinated appearance.
- Outdoor lighting ideas on the exterior of your home are very helpful for creating ambience. They highlight the mood, the garden, and/or the home as well as provide general illumination at night. Use layers of lighting for any exterior plan. Small lights are useful for guiding walkways, up lighting for trees and/or vegetation, low lighting for ambience, and lanterns in areas for socializing.
In this case, I would say, ‘Your landscape light should be on a dimmer so that you can vary the levels of lighting. Here are some various ways to do outdoor lighting.
1. Use Wall Lighting to Create a Patio:
Patios provide you with a versatile outdoor space that can take you from day to night no matter what the weather is. If you want your patio to look great at night then patio lighting is essential. Wall lights are a great choice of outdoor lighting that’s both practical and atmospheric, whatever the size or style. The outdoor lighting above provides effective task lighting for illuminating different areas of the garden, defining boundaries, and linking different areas within a larger garden.
These lights are ideal for illuminating the features within your garden and are particularly useful as a gentle source of light when you need to relax or entertain in the evening.
2. Spotlights Illuminate Your Living Wall:
A living wall can add visual interest and color to your outdoor garden or patio. This outdoor living area was uplit with embedded patio lights, creating a warm inviting atmosphere. Many people choose to buy an in-ground garden lighting system as they are more expensive to install. However, they do offer a number of benefits over using other methods of lighting. For example, you will be able to grow your plants more successfully and see them for many years to come.
However, if the walls are placed too far apart then the wall will not be properly lit, says landscape architect John Davies. For this garden, we chose a wall light that can be moved further away but still light the wall successfully.
3. Adding Wall Light Will Give Guests a Warm Welcome:
Outdoor lighting can bring life to the entry to your house and when curated properly it can transform your front porch ideas. When I first started working with outdoor lighting, I had no idea where to begin or what kind of outdoor lighting system would be best for my home.
Consider, too, if garden security lighting needs to be part of the equation here.
'First and foremost, ask yourself, what is the overall feeling that you want your front porch design to have? The shape of the fixture adds interest and should support your "vision". Consider quality, buy quality lighting whenever you can.
You also can add some special effects to it by changing the lighting, like putting some white lights behind your models, and then you don’t need to take as much of the picture. For this project, my goal was to create a white-out monochromatic design, and instead focus on textural shapes. I’m always interested in mixing vintage into a design.
4. Consider Wildlife While Planning Your Outdoor Lighting:
One of the things to consider when planning garden lighting is wildlife habitat. The impact of light on wildlife is dramatic. Animals need to take their cues from the rising and setting of the sun, so artificial light can throw this into flux.
Lighting the sky is one of the most effective ways to make your yard look inviting, but if your light fixtures are high up and shine into the sky, they’ll increase the amount of light coming in. By positioning lights lower down and/or fitting hoods, you can reduce the amount of light shining into the sky.
Early research shows that bright lights can have a negative impact on wildlife. The impacts of these colors vary, but generally, lights with red, yellow and green seem to have less of an impact than the lights that are white and blue. When choosing where to install a light, you should know that bats will avoid lights that have been installed by other means. There are a few things you can do to encourage bats to use your garden as a shelter and roost, such as building bat houses.
5. Illuminate Steps with Step Light:
Discover ways to illuminate your garden's borders and steps, and how to do so without a large investment. Steps can be illuminated from any direction above, below or from any side.
'Lighting steps is mainly about making them safe. We always try to make the lighting as even as possible without too much glare, the best way to do this is to aim the light across the steps so it doesn’t point straight into the faces of anyone using them. For that reason, we wouldn’t put lights in the risers unless that was the only option. If you are lucky enough to have walls at the side of your steps, you have a great place to put your lights.
The best place to hang your lights would be on the walls, to give you an uncluttered look. Step lights with built-in eye shields are a great idea for many environments. If you use them in poorly lit spaces, they're sure to improve safety.
6. Light Up the Tree with Spot Lights:
In the past, it was common practice to provide focal points and light sources within a house or building. Today, you can still use this method with plants in a pot or between trees. It also works well for lighting walls.
The lights should have a focused beam so that they create interesting patterns of light and shadow on the surfaces. 'Hedging' is very difficult to light successfully. Instead, plant trees within an enclosed hedge space and uplight them. To light a hedge, use a single light on a stand or a small light kit.
Position the light near the top of the hedge and light the foliage closest to the light. Use a low diffusion surface light to create a soft, even light on the hedge.
7. Light Up the Main Garden:
Focusing on the garden itself, you can use lighting ideas to create a feature of trees, highlight sculptures and turn fountains into dynamic sparkling features.
Award-winning garden designer, Janine Pattison of JPS Landscape Design uses a range of techniques to achieve these effects. 'We employ uplighting, downlighting, silhouetting, and spotlighting, which, combined with careful use of color, add a touch of lifestyle chic to a garden,' she explains.
Uplighting is often used to illuminate special features, such as a sculpture or tree. It’s the single spotlights shining down the whole time that make everything stand out against the dark. Downlighting produces the same effect as uplighting, however, the spotlight is placed in the up position and the beam is focused down. Moonlight through a tree creates a dappled effect similar to moonlight. Backlighting a feature throws it into silhouette, and when used in combination with these other techniques, it helps contribute to a theatrical 3-D effect.
8. Be the Feature of Pool with Light:
Contemporary cascades, feature fountains, and reflective pools are beautiful throughout the day, but they are really incredible when underwater lighting should be used under clear, glass-bottomed boats and diving equipment to illuminate objects underwater.
London garden designer Sarah Jane Rothwell has a number of ideas for improving your water feature. Here are some ideas. Light is made into movement as water flows, and shadows are reflected by it. Corten steel is a stunning choice for a bath. It will create a warm glow that reflects off the surface and looks
The best small cascades are direct underwater spotlights onto the plinth of flowing water, or a fiber optic light strip running along the rill from which the water emerges. Fiber optics can be fully integrated into a cascade or fountain, making the water look like it's illuminated from within, and locating a fiber optic in the jet of a bubbling fountain gives the impression of a night light glowing inside. You can add a splash of color to any pool, but underwater lights should be avoided in planted ponds, as they will highlight weeds and roots.
In place of a fountain, direct light from a bright lamp onto a planting or a sculpture close to the pond, which will then reflect off the water, causing the reflection to look much more powerful.