Landscape lighting adds a touch of style, excitement, and elegance to your home’s exterior. It can make your house stand out from the rest on the block and help you celebrate special occasions and holidays.
However, knowing a few dos and don’ts is important to get the most out of landscape lighting. To help, here are some tips for transforming your home into a dynamic showpiece that lights up the neighborhood.
Prioritize Lighting Your House First
With landscape lighting, one of the most essential dos is to focus on your house first. Your home is typically the most expensive part of your property, so you want to ensure it looks as good as possible. Outdoor LED lighting and color changing landscape lights can wash your exterior with light or add a soft glow around windows, doorways, and other architectural features.
Highlighting trees, a water feature, or a garden path should come second. While these can all be great additions to your landscape lighting setup, the focus should always remain on your house first. After all, you don’t want trees detracting from the beauty of your home with too much light.
Don’t Group Too Many Fixtures in One Space
Another important don’t is to avoid grouping too many fixtures in one space. Gathering a lot of lights together can produce an unnatural and unappealing look. On the contrary, spreading them out more will help make your landscape lighting look better and create depth. You can also use different colors or add motion-activated lights for drama.
Also, any lighting you include should be subtle yet striking. Make sure the light color and intensity are not too intense, as this can hurt your eyes and look relatively unpleasant. You want to highlight key features of your home without overpowering them with too much light or competing fixtures. Smart landscape lights can come in handy here as they give more control over the light intensity and color.
Get Creative With Pathway Landscape Lights
Pathway lights take your landscape to the next level. You can use them to accentuate a garden path, highlight a walkway, or even make your driveway look more inviting. Outdoor LED lighting is best suited for pathways. It’s energy efficient, and its light color can be adjusted depending on the look you want to create. Consider using fixtures like path lights, up lights, and tiki torch lights.
Color-changing landscape lights also add a dramatic effect. They look excellent when placed along the edges of a walkway or driveway. You could also mix and match colors to create an unforgettable atmosphere for your home. Consider installing lights controlled by a mobile app, so you can change the color on demand for different effects and take pathway lighting to the next level.
Don’t Overlook Small Spaces
Finally, pay attention to small spaces with landscape lighting. You can use up and down lights to highlight minor details in your garden or deck area, such as a bird bath, a trellis covered with a climbing plant, or an ornamental tree. These small touches will help create a cohesive and inviting atmosphere in your outdoor space.
Accent lighting is a great way to make dark corners in your yard, the second floor of your home, and similar spaces pop. For example, you can highlight a flower bed with a strip of LED lights.
By following these dos and don’ts for landscape lighting, you’ll create a stunning outdoor display that makes your house look better than ever! With just the right lighting balance, you can turn your home into the envy of the neighborhood.
