Whether you’re hosting a barbecue, sitting around the pool, or increasing security around your home, the right outdoor lighting is essential. Outdoor lighting can transform your front and back yards from basic to beautiful by adding a warm and welcoming aspect to your home’s entrance and exterior spaces. Illumination provides the perfect landscape ambiance for an outdoor get-together, increases safety for your family, and creates focal points both on our home and in your landscape. In this post, we break down everything you need to know about choosing the right outdoor lighting for your home.
Choosing the Right Lighting
Many things should be considered when choosing the right outdoor lighting, as different lights work for different situations or spaces. The main goal is finding proper balance between light and shadow. This is achieved by using a combination of different lighting types and finding a design that complements your yard and home designs.
Types of lighting to consider in your outdoor lighting projects should include:
- Overall Lighting – illumination for a whole space or outdoor room
- Task Lighting – lighting for a specific purpose
- Accent Lighting – light designed to draw attention to an area or object
Identifying Our Lighting Needs
Finding a balance is important when trying to determine the proper amount of outdoor lighting to use. If you add too much light, the pleasant ambiance will be lost. Using too little light can be potentially dangerous for you and your guests. The proper amount of lighting will provide aesthetic appeal, while making your family and guests feel comfortable in the space. In short, the lights need to enhance the look of your home while eliminating shadows and providing safety.
To Light or Not to Light
Study your space during the day before designing an outdoor lighting plan. Look around and choose your favorite aspects of the landscape. Do you want to highlight a water feature, perhaps a pool or large fish pond? Maybe a beautiful tree or garden is what you’d like to accentuate. Lighting can transform your yard by making these aspects focal points at night. Something as simple as having a light positioned to graze a basic stone wall can add a dramatic flair to an otherwise overlooked area.
Functional outdoor lighting is another area to consider. Lighting deck stairs, entryways, and pathways ensures that your family and your guests can navigate areas more safely. Outdoor lighting will also increase the value of the property should you ever decide to put your home on the market.
Effects of Outdoor Lighting
Different effects can be achieved through choosing different types of outdoor lighting, especially in landscaping. Here are a few of those effects, which can all be beneficial if used properly:
- Up lighting – great for taller structures and plants
- Silhouetting – perfect for highlighting those overlooked areas
- Shadowing – fantastic for painting the exterior walls with shadows of your plants
- Moon lighting – very effective use of light within branches of tall trees
- Grazing – best used with hardscape as the light uses texture to create dramatic shadow play
- Washing – wonderful for those larger spaces that need more ambient lighting
Before Deciding
Choosing the right outdoor lighting can be difficult. Deciding on the types, effects, and the proper amount of lighting to achieve your goals can raise several questions, but we’re here to help. Epling Landscaping and Lawn Service will help you decide which lighting choices and effects will best fulfill your lighting needs. We will assist in creating the optimal landscape ambiance for your outdoor space, as well as enhance the security of your home. All outdoor lighting and landscape design installed comes with The Epling Guarantee making your investment one in which you can have confidence. Call us today to get started on improving the outdoor look of your home!
