LED lighting uses far less voltage, costs less money, lasts much longer and still gives off the same brilliant light as traditional bulbs. There are endless ways you can use LED landscape lighting to highlight the appearance of your property, while also providing added safety as well. Light up your home, business or community with these LED landscape lighting ideas.
Types Of Landscape Lighting Styles
Before you can pick the perfect LED landscape lighting for your property you need to know the different lighting styles available, such as wash, bullet, garden and well. Here are some of the more popular types of landscape light styles, as well as tips for making them work in any yard.
Wash: Wash lighting is low to the ground and gives off a softer light often used to brighten privacy fences, garden walls and other flat facades.
Bullet: Bullet lighting fixtures tend to be very small and can be used for a lot of different purposes. They give off a narrow beam of light often used to highlight certain exterior features on buildings, tree trunks or bountiful garden bushes.
Garden: Garden lights are low-lying but include a 19-24-inch post that shows off the actual lighting fixture more so than the previous two types of fixtures. This type of light reaches up over low garden canopies and shines down from above. Garden style lighting is also popularly used as pathway markers.
Well: Well lighting is buried in the ground, just like water wells. The waterproof housing located just beneath ground surface hides and protects the actual LED bulb. This style makes it nearly impossible to detect the source of light without a closer look. This style is available with fixed or swiveling bulbs, and is popularly used at the base of a wall or underside of foliage.
Downlight: Downlight fixtures are placed up high and aimed down at the ground. They may be placed on branches, rooftops or any other location with some height. Due to the location of these fixtures it’s important to go for durable resin fixtures to prevent constant repairs.
Flood: Flood style lights are big and bright, casting 40 degrees or more of light with more brightness than a wash light. You don’t want to overuse this type of lighting, use in moderation to light up trees or larger decorative elements.
Where To Place LED Landscape Lighting For A Balanced Look
When planning out the overall map for your lighting fixtures there a few key areas to keep in mind. On a typical building and surrounding property there are different types of lighting fixtures that serve different purposes. The goal is for all lights to work together. Common places that need lighting include trees, garden beds, buildings, walls and focal points.
Trees are a great place to use landscape lighting, and they give you a lot of options. Bullet, flood or downlight style lighting all work great depending on the overall look you are going for and the size of the tree. Tree ring light fixtures are an awesome option, as they are designed to easily attach to any tree around the trunk or a branch. Our resin LED tree rings come with up to 6 lights per ring, all of which can be aimed in any direction you want, giving off the perfect amount of light. Plus, they are 100% customizable. Ground lights may be directed straight up into the top of the tree, and downlights may be used up high in branches to give the opposite effect. If you use more than one light per tree make sure the light paths do not cross, but instead point in different directions.
Garden beds are another key place for lighting. When lighting up your garden you might be tempted to use a lot of different lighting fixtures to highlight all of the beautiful flowers after dark. Expert opinion cautions against this and advises spreading lighting fixtures at least 20 feet apart. This is because you want different swaths of light to capture the eye and move it along, as opposed to one huge pool of light with no beginning, middle or end.
Buildings are another popular place to include landscape lighting, after all you want people to be able to find the front door entrance and see their way around the outskirts of the building. Once again, you’ve got a lot of options, but most popularly bullet or wash lights are used on buildings. The goal is to aim the lights at just the right places, such as nice architectural detailing or towards the corners of the building.
Landscaping walls often include well, bullet or flood lighting. A highly recommended location for wall lighting is to place fixtures down near the base of the structure to highlight the texture and shape of the wall.
Focal points need landscape lighting; after all they are one of the main attractions. Flood, bullet or wash lighting may be used to highlight star quality elements, such as a water fountain, tree swing, or arbor. When shinning lights at a dimensional piece it is recommended to use two or more lighting fixtures aimed at the object so that they intersect. This reduces the appearance of spooky shadows likely to occur if only one light is used. (Reference)
Quality Over Everything Else
LED light bulbs contain no filament to break or burn out meaning LED lighting can last up to 20 years of regular use. This is far beyond what ordinary light bulbs are capable of. While you pay for LED lighting it is worth it and does pay for itself over time.
LED lighting will only last as long as the fixture housing it. Materials prone to rusting, staining or failing apart due to natural exposures will decrease the shelf life of any lighting. Resin lighting fixtures that resist water, impact, and even graffiti are necessary for outdoor lighting systems, regardless of how mild the weather is in your area. Dogs will come by and lift a leg, lawn mowers and weed whackers will take hits at low-lying fixtures, and if you live near the ocean the moist and salty air will provoke damage even faster.
TerraCast LED resin lighting fixtures will make your life so much easier, and your landscaping more beautiful. Check out our wide selection of landscape lighting fixtures and experience the perks of our specially formulated resin materials: no rusting, no stains, no nicks, and no water damage, just guaranteed long lasting lighting fixtures.