Garden lighting makes gardens attractive and accessible long after dusk and allows
gardens to be enjoyed after a hard days work when the sun has set. Lighting adds
atmosphere to an evening garden, allowing access at anytime. At night your landscape
can wear a different face and have a totally different look from its daytime
appearance.

Beauty

Give your garden an elegant look by adding lighting to it. To enjoy your garden at
night, the lighting must be just right. Beautiful glass oil lanterns will add a sparkle in
daylight and a magical glow in the evening. Landscapes emerge at dark under subtle
lighting to create wonderful shapes in hauntingly beautiful sculptured drama. Whether
glowing with an inner light or outlined in an elegant tracery against the night sky,
landscape lighting paints the beauty of natural and cultivated forms, a pool, fountains
and pathways with subtle shade, shadow and colour.

Benefits

Lighting has a number of benefits including, Safety - illuminating pathways, indicating
hazards, such as steps, or marking safest routes. Path lighting provides a safe walkway
and adds to your home’s security. Atmosphere - The loss of daily enjoyment is solvable
through garden lighting, by transforming darkened patios, decks and flower beds into
a welcome fantasy of light.

Safety

Lighting steps for safety is an obvious requirement in any garden, but functionality can
be coupled with decorative merit if the lighting is subtle. Safety is always the key
consideration. All lighting units need to be certified as suitable for outdoor use, which
generally means they must be weather proof. There is perhaps nothing more
beckoning than a well lit garden path.

Different Techniques of Garden Lighting:



- Up lighting is the most commonly used technique to illuminate trees, walls and
sculptures and down lighting is a mimic of natural light - the fixture is located
overhead with the light shining down from above.



- Moonlighting can be achieved by placing the fixture high above the ground and to
produce a broad, moonlight effect.



- Shadowing techniques require the strong shape of plants such as yucca's, and
surfaces such as a wall or lawn to create the most powerful effect.
- Spotlighting is used sparingly to pick out larger plants, trees, statues and
architectural features.
- Floodlights are a broad light beam that covers large areas and can create dramatic
silhouettes.



- Accent Lights are small fixtures placed close to the ground which provide a subtle
source of decorative lighting almost anywhere in the garden.



- Spread lighting uses wide beam angles to light larger features such as lawn areas,
flowerbeds and borders and low shrubs makes strolling around a garden in the late
evening very pleasurable.



- Cross technique is used to pick out and highlight the statue, urn, gnarled tree
trunk, bonsai, archway, etc.



- Silhouetting technique is often used to highlight the outline trees, palms or
archways.

Garden Lighting ideas

To create a balanced and interesting atmosphere in the night time garden, use a
variety of fixtures and lighting angles, placing fixtures in the foreground, middle
distance and background. A really quick and easy way to add light to the garden,
without wiring, is a kit that uses solar cells to collect power during the day and lights
up at night. Kits are available at most discount stores and also with discount online
shopping.

Up lighting, down lighting and side lighting are the three basic forms of garden lighting.
Use a combination of all the three for the most pleasing result. Lighting systems come
in low-voltage and standard-voltage configurations. Use standard voltage for large
areas and for security, low voltage to accent individual plants.