Garden lights in your landscape

Garden lights can not only make your landscape safer at night, but can turn your garden into a magical fantasy after dark. You can use garden lighting inexpensively, easily and in a way that is friendly to the environment. Using solar and low voltage lights are low-cost ways to make your landscape glow. Here are some ideas on how to use garden lights in your landscape.

Instructions

Step 1

Front garden lighting with low voltage floods

Use low voltage flood lights in front of an area to create a glowing tableau in the nighttime garden.

Step 2

Accent lighting with low voltage lights

Spotlight garden focal points with brighter lights. You can use low voltage lights suspended from tree limbs, arches, poles or hidden by structures to pick out a small area and accent it with a stronger brilliance.

Step 3

Pick out a pathway with solar lamps.

Line pathways for effect and for safety. Lights can follow along a garden stairway for safety or meander along the course of a walkway. A curve of glittering solar lamps snaking up a hillside can trace out an intriguing design in the darkness.

Step 4

Use garden lights as decor. Ornamental low voltage lights can create interest in themselves, day or night. You can find enchanting fixtures that look like twining plants, fascinating sculptures, or use fixtures that glimmer with multiple stained glass colors or mimic candles flickering in the dark.

Step 5

Low voltage lights use very little electricity and there are styles that are fancy and expensive, simple and good for any budget or somewhere in between. You will need a transformer. The size will depend on how many lights you will be needing. There is little concern for electric shock with low voltage and you can clip your lights to a running cord, placing them wherever you will get the best effects in your garden. In short, low voltage lights are easy to use and don't have to cost a lot to be effective.

Step 6

Don't be put off by price. Many styles of solar lights are available for inexpensive prices. Even if the fixture is not expensive, a well designed placement can make your garden look like a million! And solar lights need no electric outlets or cords so you are free to place them anywhere they can recharge in full daytime sunshine.

Step 7

Choose the style of lamp that will best reflect the feel of your garden. You can use several styles in different areas to achieve different effects.

Step 8

Get creative. Build your own set of lights. This low voltage light is packaged in a simple wooden casing and raised on a piece of 2 x 4. It is a part of a regimen of lights that lineup like little soldiers to guide cars up a dark driveway at night.

Step 9

You can also call in a professional lighting designer for help. Lighting designers can design your whole area. Or you can invite a lighting expert over for a consultation to offer you some help with your own ideas. For more information on how to use garden lights in your landscape, please see the links in Resources listed below.