The outdoor lighting of the house can be an attractive decoration of the entrance, facade, alleys and garden. And after dark, you’ll feel safer and more confident. You will get the best results when you plan the outdoor lighting of the entire property around the house at the same time.
If you have a garden, make sure you consider: walkways, stairs, trees, flower beds, gazebos or a possible barbecue area. The good news is – modern patio lighting can be energy efficient and durable too. Halogens, fluorescent lamps or LEDs, thanks to their small dimensions, are easy to combine in different assemblies. Solar lamps are also becoming more and more popular. One can choose between durable drive-on lighting fixtures that are placed in the surface and those that are equipped with a pointed element designed to be inserted into the ground.
Choose only lighting fixtures suitable for outdoor use
When choosing an outdoor lighting fixture that will illuminate the yard, it is necessary to check whether it has the appropriate degree of tightness, which is marked with the abbreviation IP (Index of Protection). It is expressed as a two-digit number and characterizes the tightness of the lighting fixture. The first number indicates the degree of resistance to dust and solids, the second to moisture and water.
For outdoor mounted luminaires, the IP must be high. In the garden, the lighting fixtures are exposed to contact with dust and soil, they are splashed and sometimes flooded with water, so the most suitable are those with IP 55 (protection against dust and water jets) or IP 56 (protection against dust and strong jets of water or flood waves).
Lighting fixtures must also have a marked protection class, which characterizes the type of electrical insulation. Class I or II lamps can be used in the garden (where I means poorer insulation).
Entrance door and walkway lighting
Choose lighting fixtures that illuminate the stairs and doorways well. The main thing is the lighting above the door. Depending on the rest of the lamps in this area, they may have different power, so it is worth thinking about the spotlights built into the wall in advance.
The character of this place will be given by an additional beam of light above selected attractive details: cornices, niches or flower boxes. The selected lighting fixtures must not only match the style of the house, but also have a suitable IP rating, which determines the resistance of the lighting fixture to external factors
Those solar flashes placed on the side of the alleys or in the lawn will mark the course of the road. However, mounted on poles, placed on both sides, they will evenly illuminate the upper walkway. Do not forget to keep the proportions: the shorter the alley, the smaller the lamps. Lighting fixtures should be arranged so that there are no large dark spaces between them.
The idea is not to illuminate the entire garden, but to choose those parts of it that deserve to be highlighted with light. Focus your attention on the most beautiful trees, the most well-kept shrubs and the plants that grow along the paths. It is best to make a sketch of the whole garden and set the lighting in different combinations. Solar lights will work in many places in the garden, so it pays to choose as many as possible.