6 Tips to Adding Landscape Lighting to Your Yard

Adding lighting to your yard is not only an easy way to make your yard look better, it's also an improvement that can help the ambiance of your yard and make your home safer. The tricky part is deciding what type of landscape lighting is best for your home, as well as laying it out in a manner that complements your lifestyle. To help you get started, we've compiled six tips and ideas that you should keep in mind when you add landscape lights to your home.

1. Consider the Reasons to Use Landscape Lighting

Landscape lighting is both functional and beautiful. It provides safety by illuminating walkways, stairs, driveways, outdoor seating areas and entryways, as well as highlights the plant life and unique design elements of your landscaping. Additionally, outdoor lighting means you don’t have to limit your outdoor entertaining to just the daylight hours. You can have barbecues, drinks and leisure time with friends and family well into the evening hours.

2. Decide What You Want to Illuminate

If you simply want a safer yard, it may be enough to install basic lights along your driveway or any pathways leading to your garage or exterior doors. You could make it even safer with motion-sensing lights that come on whenever someone approaches your home.

However, if your lawn has a gorgeous rosebush, a large tree or some other unique feature that you want to highlight, you could probably go with a simple accent light fixture, but there are a number of options available to help you achieve this. Or maybe you have an outdoor area that you like to work or entertain in during the evening hours. String lights are always a great choice for adding ambiance to these areas.

No matter what your lighting needs are, there is certainly a lighting style that will perfectly illuminate your yard to your liking.

3. Choose a Light Source

There are three common types of sources for landscape lighting: solar, low-voltage and high-voltage. Each of the three options have their own set of benefits and drawbacks, and there's no doubt that some yards might be more suited to one type of lighting than another.

• Solar Lighting:

If you are on a budget or prefer something that's incredibly environmentally friendly, consider using solar powered lights. Since solar lights rely on harnessing energy from the sun, you won’t spend extra money on your energy bill every month. If you can place your lights where they receive direct sunlight throughout the day, they won’t require any cords, which makes them easy to install yourself. However, if the space you wish to light doesn’t receive sun during the day, you will need to invest in and install a solar panel to provide the necessary power to the lights.

• Low-Voltage Lighting:

The most common landscape lighting option is low-voltage. Low-voltage lights use only 10 percent of the power that a traditional 120-volt system does. It relies on stepped-down power from your home. This system requires a 12-volt transformer, bulbs of various brightness, colors and beam widths, and fixture housing, which protects the bulbs from weather damage and shapes the beams to your liking. You’ll also need stakes to hold the fixtures in place and the proper cables to carry the current through the lights’ wires.

• Line-Voltage Lighting:

If you have a large yard, or if you have several different features in your yard that you want to shed light on, you’ll need to use a 120-volt "line voltage" lighting system. This type of lighting must be buried at least 18 inches below the ground or encased in a conduit that protects the electrical current from water. Because of the amount of electricity they use, a licensed electrician must install them, which makes them more expensive than solar or low-voltage lighting systems.

4. Understand Different Lighting Techniques

The placement and layout of your landscape lighting will vary depending on the yard and what you want to achieve by adding lights. Here are three common ways that you can use your landscape lights to achieve different effects.

• Path-Lighting:

One of the most common lighting effects is to simply illuminate potential safety hazards in common pathways. This may include steps on stairways, rails on your deck, or walkways outside your home, but is also a great lighting technique to highlight masonry or other borders in your yard.

• Grazing:

If you’d like to emphasize a specific texture in your yard, such as climbing ivy or tall pillars in front of your home, consider using the grazing technique. The grazing effect uses a strategically placed light beam within 12 inches of the area you want to cast light on, which is aimed upwards on the item you want to illuminate.

• Wall-Washing:

This technique uses flood lights to completely "wash" the wall or area with light. Oftentimes, this will include multiple light fixtures that are installed a few feet away and angled to provide smooth coverage across the area.

Other Techniques Include:

• Shadowing
• Up-lighting / Down-lighting
• Silhouetting
• Moonlighting

Keep in mind that what you wish to illuminate will determine which technique you use. For example, trees look best with bullet or flood lighting, but be sure to illuminate the trunks or else they may end up looking like floating bushes in your yard. Flower-focused fixtures should have at least 20 feet between each light source to avoid flooding the area with too much light, and if you want a very specific focus, it may be wise to use at least two light beams on the plant or structure to avoid harsh shadows.

As always, be sure to talk to a product expert if you are unsure of which type of landscape lighting would suit your yard best.

5. Know the Costs Involved

There are many considerations that come with choosing outdoor light fixtures. Cost is just one of the factors, but it has many variables that you should keep in mind. Common factors that contribute to the varying cost of landscape lighting include the type of fixture you choose, the method of illumination, the type of bulb you use, and whether you install yourself or hire a professional.

If you choose to go the DIY route, individual solar lights are affordable and require zero installation costs. However, if you go with low-voltage or line-voltage lighting, you'll need to consider the cost of fixtures, as well as the cost of any necessary electrical cable and a transformer. You'll also have to consider the cost of hiring a professional.

Another consideration is the overall cost of upkeep. Halogen bulbs are cheaper to purchase initially, but will cost more in the long term between energy bills and replacement bulbs. Whereas, landscape LED lighting is more expensive initially, but is cheaper in the long run as it doesn’t use as much energy and will last for many years.

When factoring costs, look over your warranty, too. Pay close attention to what it covers and how long it lasts. The manufacturer warranty for landscape light fixtures often covers many years.

6. Other Things to Keep In Mind

If you decide to purchase and install your own landscape lighting, it would be wise to have some general dimensions of your yard and be aware of the limitations that might affect your ability to use certain lights. Consult with professionals to help ensure that you get the lights that suit your landscaping needs.

During the installation, be sure you dig trenches to the right depth and connect fixtures safely. To determine what size transformer you need, calculate the watt capacity by adding the total wattage of all your lights and multiplying the total by 1.25. Keep in mind that if you don’t already have the proper transformer receptacle installed, an electrician will need to install it. If you have any doubts about the electrical requirements or the installation, it is strongly recommended that you hire some one to do the job correctly and safely.

Final Thoughts

Use this landscape lighting guide to help you design an inviting space. Once you’ve spent a few weekends enjoying your newly illuminated evening with family and friends, you may just wonder why you didn’t install outdoor lighting sooner!