Landscape lighting is a design problem before it is a shopping problem
Landscape lighting lights the yard rather than the building: walkways, beds, trees, steps, driveways, the path from the car to the door. Done well, it looks like the yard is lit and not like a row of lamps. Done badly, it looks like an airport runway down the driveway.
What goes in a typical plan
Most plans start with the walk, which is the piece that earns its cost every single evening. Uplighting on a good tree changes the whole front of a property after dark. Beds, steps, walls and the drive fill in the rest, and some of that is safety more than style.
Landscape, patio and security lighting overlap
The request almost never stays in one lane. Patio lighting is what turns a patio
https://evercrestlighting.com/ into somewhere you sit in the evening. Security lighting handles the parts of the property nobody can see from the street. Accent lighting picks out the details worth picking out.
Common mistakes
The most common mistake is too much of it. Even light across the whole yard kills the contrast that makes it look good. Badly aimed fixtures throw glare down the walk instead of on the ground. The third is ignoring how the yard will look in five years, when the shrub in front of the uplight has doubled.
Businesses and communities
Businesses use the same tools for different reasons. A restaurant patio needs light people want to sit under. Parking and walkways come down to safety. A neighborhood entrance is about the first impression of the whole community, which is why entry lighting gets attention in planned developments.
How they work as one design
Roofline lighting handles the building. Landscape lighting handles everything else. Most properties want both. Roofline light gives the house a shape after dark, and the yard lighting gives the front of the property depth.A single design avoids a mismatched result, which is the usual problem when a second company adds to a first company's work. If the budget only covers one this year, a good designer will tell you which half to do first, and the answer is not always the house.Unlike a roofline system, ground level fixtures shift. Mowers, growing shrubs and time nudge fixtures out of position. Once a year it is worth walking the yard and correcting the aim, which takes very little time and makes an obvious difference.
Where to go from here
The plan comes from walking the property, not picked from a page. EverCrest Lighting installs landscape lighting as well as patio, accent, security and permanent LED roofline lighting for residential and commercial properties. Working out of Greenville, South Carolina, they cover Upstate South Carolina and Western North Carolina. The consultation is free and the design is drawn for your property. Reach them at (864) 252-1732 or
[email protected].