Next time you pull up to your house and into your driveway at night, pause for a minute.
Does your home seem bright and welcoming? Or dark and gloomy?
Instead of pulling right into the garage, hop out and pretend you’re a guest. Head to the front door. Do you feel safe and welcomed? Or are you worried you might trip?
The best landscape lighting companies can help you light up your home and landscaping in ways you might not have even considered.
Here are seven benefits of landscape lighting and why it's worth it.
1. Landscape Lighting Improves Walkways, Steps, and Stairs
If you walk on it, you should light it.
That means walkways, paths, steps, and stairs. You can’t feel confident about your property’s safety without lighting these crucial spots.
Worried that step lights will trip you? Don’t be. They tuck out of sight, flush to the back part of the step, adding just enough light to see where you’re going.
Pro outdoor lighting tip: Walkway and path lights should be staggered along paths, so it doesn’t look like an airport runway.
But avoid those lantern-style lights lining your paths. All you see is the bulb, so you have a bunch of bright dots in your landscape.
Instead, choose fixtures with caps that direct the light down, so you don’t see the fixture or bulb — you just see nice light illuminating your path.
2. Adds Safety and Security
Expert landscape lighting will deter people from looking in your windows or lurking in the bushes. It makes it easy for neighbors to spot any would-be prowlers.
A benefit of landscape lighting is that it keeps your entries safe and welcoming for both you and your guests. Lighting steps keeps people from tripping.
Today’s controllers make landscape lighting for safety and security easier than ever — you can control everything from your smartphone.
3. Outdoor Lighting Adds Curb Appeal
Next time you’re driving through a neighborhood at night, take note of the most impressive houses.
They’ll be the ones with professional outdoor lighting that highlights all the home’s best features.
Light architectural features like stone veneer, arches and columns, trees, shrubs, and your front walkway.
Great landscape lighting draws the eye to your whole house.
4. Landscape Lighting Can Show Off Your Plants
Another benefit of landscape lighting, you’ll be amazed how magical your favorite landscaping plants look when illuminated at night.
The lacy leaves of Japanese maples cast delicate, captivating shadows.
Landscape lighting in Orlando, FL means adding extra drama to our big, bold tropical plants. That six-foot tall Croton adds stunning color to your yard during the day, but dramatic shadows at night.
Uplight your Pygmy Date Palm and watch how its multiple trunks take on a whole new look once the sun goes down.
You’ve invested a lot in your landscaping plants. Why not show them off at night, too?
5. Outdoor Lights Make Entertaining Easier
Here in central Florida, we love our outdoor hangouts year-round. So why shut down the fun when the sun goes down?
Take a good look at the spots in your yard where you relax, entertain, and have fun. Do they have lighting? Why not?
Think pergolas, fire pits, patios, sitting walls, outdoor kitchens.
Lighting highlights the architecture of these pretty spots, enhances their safety, creates cozy ambiance, and sets the mood for evening entertaining.
Don’t waste your prime real estate by letting it hide in the dark.
6. Landscape Lighting Enhances Your Entryway
This seems like a no brainer, but you’d be surprised how many entrances have inadequate light.
Old, dated fixtures with dingy incandescent bulbs detract from your home’s appeal and hamper your safety.
Expert lighting spills enough light to safely illuminate your way and highlight your front door without casting a glare. That's why it's a landscape lighting benefit.
A combination of tasteful floodlights from below and attractive lighting from above work together for beauty and security.
7. Improves Your Driveway Appearance
If you haven’t given much thought to your driveway lighting, you should.
You can’t just depend on your car’s headlights to illuminate the way.
The right driveway lighting keeps you and your visitors safe, prevents accidents, deters intruders, and can actually boost your curb appeal.
Use lighting to define your driveway’s borders, mark the end so people can easily see where to enter, and guide foot traffic from your driveway to your front or side door.
If trees line your driveway, use uplighting to highlight them. You’ll accentuate your landscaping and help illuminate your driveway at the same time. You can see why landscape lighting is worth the investment.
A Few Landscape Lighting Tips
1. Don't Use Outdoor Solar Lighting
Yes, they’re easy and cheap and tempting, but please, just say no to those flimsy solar light fixtures.
The solar panels don’t last long, so you’re just wasting your money.
And it’s wasteful to keep throwing your worn-out plastic fixtures into the landfill. The environment will thank you for going with hard-wired lighting, and your home will look more high-end, too.
Today’s LED lighting uses a small fraction of the energy older incandescent landscape lighting does.
2. Have Different Landscape Lighting Zones
Consider a landscape lighting system with separate zones you can control.
That lets you put different areas of your yard on their own timers to stay on longer or turn off sooner.
Keep in mind you can install the transformer, wires, and minimum fixtures for now, and add in more fixtures over time.
Once your yard is wired, it’s easy to add more fixtures.
3. Not All Landscape Lighting Companies Are Experts
Landscape lighting is trickier than it looks.
If it isn’t installed by experts, it can cast an uncomfortable and unattractive glare.
There’s more to it than it looks, from the right fixtures for the right spot to the right color temperature for the bulbs.
Is uplighting best for a certain spot? Or downlighting?
You don’t want to mess this up. Your homeowner pride is on the line.
We’d love to help you do it right.
Trust Your Landscape Lighting in Central FL to Ground Source.
We’re landscape lighting experts, but our skills don’t stop there. We’re with you every step of the way as you plan your perfect outdoor space.
Sod, irrigation, landscape design: Let us transform your yard from an embarrassing eyesore to a place you spend every spare minute.
Are you ready to enjoy the vibrant, impressive yard you've always wanted? Request a quote today! We’ll help you review your options and then transform your property.
