Your home’s outdoor lighting always matters, and for more reasons than you might think. Good lighting not only enhances the aesthetics of your home, it also ensures safety and security for yourself and your family. However, like any other endeavour, it’s vital you know what you’re doing to ensure you’re doing the job right.
When it comes to creating a unique ambiance with your lighting, it pays to know which outdoor lighting ideas will achieve the effects you want. Manipulating light properly requires more than setting up lights and bathing the area in light. Here are a few things to keep in mind when crafting just the right atmosphere for your landscape.
Creating Functional and Stylish Zones
Your outdoor lighting really serves two purposes: creating functional zones, and enhancing your outdoor spaces’ aesthetic charm. For example, pathway lights illuminate walkways so you know where you’re going, but also add some visual flair as you walk. Meanwhile, you can bathe the seating areas in soft, warm lighting to add a sense of comfort and intimacy during meals and conversations.
As for visual elements like trees, fountains, or statues, accent lighting gives you the option of highlighting those features, elevating your landscape’s visual appeal. Lighting puts the spotlight, so to speak, on those elements, making them the star attractions of your landscape and impressing your visitors.
Factors to Keep in Mind
When it comes to working with outdoor lights, finesse and consideration are a must. It’s easy to make mistakes when setting up your lighting, and difficult to determine you’ve made one until it gets dark. Keep these factors in mind to ensure you’ve done the job correctly.
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Layered lighting
Just as you would with indoor lighting, create layers of lighting outside to create depth and dimension. Combine your ambient, task, and accent lighting to maintain balance and ambience
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Lighting types
You have a wide range of options for lighting your exterior spaces, from pathway lights to wall sconces to string lights. Experiment with different lights to create the right ambiance for your home.
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Warmth and colour
Warm, soft hues typically work best for creating a homey, relaxed atmosphere for your spaces. These colours mimic moon- and starlight, maintaining a more natural ambiance when you’re out of doors.
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Lighting angles
How you angle your lights can also have an impact on their effects. For example, downlighting is usually used to provide simple illumination, while uplighting creates dramatic effect for more prominent elements.
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Dimmers and timers
Utilize dimmers and timers to adjust the intensity of your lights and set specific times for them to illuminate your space. Not only does this allow you to modify your lights for effect, it also helps conserve energy.
3 Concrete Tips to Help With Your Lighting
Another thing that can help is having concrete steps to take with regard to your lighting. Here’s a short list of things you can do to adjust your lighting to your needs.
Assess your space and lighting needs
Before diving in and setting up your lights, it’s prudent to inspect your space and determine what your specific lighting needs are. Factors like size of the area, purpose of your space, and desired ambiance play major roles in determining what your lighting should be like. For example, lighting for your patio is a different beast than lighting than a walkway or a garden, so take those needs into account when setting up your system.
Understand the different types of outdoor lighting
Outdoor lighting comes in different forms, each of which with a different role. For example, path lighting is there to light your walkways and add ambiance while you walk. On the other hand, accent lighting is used to highlight interesting features like trees and statues. Understanding the different types of outdoor lighting helps you make informed decisions regarding the right lighting solutions for your system.
Choose energy-efficient lighting options
Energy-efficiency is a must when setting up your landscape lighting. It’s not enough to light your space, you also need to light it in a way that doesn’t hurt your wallet or cause waste. For landscape lighting, LED lights are usually the best option. These are long-lasting, energy-efficient lights, which makes them a cost-effective choice for lighting your external space.
When it comes to your landscape lighting, it always helps to work with finesse. Your landscape lighting is there to set the mood and highlight elements of your exterior spaces, and so it pays to do them justice. Always keep this short guide in mind to guide you as you develop your outdoor lighting efforts.
When you need assistance with your landscape lighting needs, give Augusta Green Sprinklers a call. We have the training and tools to help with all your landscape lighting needs, from installing your lights to upgrading your system. Give us a call now at (416) 227-1666 to get started.