Lighting the Landscape

Path lights assist with wayfinding while a pedestal planter is uplighted in this Atherton garden.

The idea of a “custom-designed landscape” evokes visions of exceptional gardens and exquisitely appointed outdoor rooms.

But what good are beautiful attractions if you can only see them 50% of the time?

Landscape lighting is an essential, but often undervalued, element of the professionally designed landscape.

Lighting in the landscape achieves several objectives: it obviously showcases the features you’ve invested significant time and money on; and it can also reveal new aspects of your garden’s beauty, in addition to guiding access and providing safety and security.

There's no shortage of books on the subject of illuminating your landscape. Most describe types of lamps and equipment, and design principles and techniques. Some will also provide pointers for the do-it-yourselfer on installation and maintenance.

But while it’s very easy to be taken by the "trade secrets" (and "advanced trade secrets") that will create all sorts of nifty lighting effects in your landscape, it’s really best to focus on the basics.

Professional lighting designers and landscape architects develop landscape lighting schemes with a handful of principles in mind:

Keep it simple. The more esoteric your fixtures, the harder it will be to replace any broken or malfunctioning ones. Those hand-blown globes from Milan may be beautiful, but will they survive the kids, pets, weather, traffic, and other rigors your yard? Similarly, the more complicated your system design, the more difficulty you'll have troubleshooting or reconfiguring it in the future.

Divide your system into zones. You may want to turn off the lights around your hot tub, whether for stargazing or privacy, without plunging the rest of your landscape into darkness. You probably want to turn on main path lights earlier, and keep them on later, than patio lights. Consider how you’ll live in your landscape, and plan your lighting accordingly.

Use a judicious variety of techniques. There’s nothing wrong with mixing downlighting, uplighting, path lights and accent spotlights. Just be sure that, as with your plantings, you don't have too many 'one-offs' that detract from a sense of continuity and cohesion in your garden. For instance, path lights are probably the most visible fixtures in your landscape, so use the same type of path light throughout your space.

Be flexible. Use only two-thirds of the capacity of each transformer, so you can add more fixtures if needed. Install extra conduit and wire for future expansion. Install extra receptacles close to your home and entertaining areas for holiday lights, temporary light fixtures, portable electronics, and so on. And install extra-long runs of wire to each fixture so it can be moved if necessary as plants mature.

Don't overlight. If everything in your garden is lit, nothing stands out. Use fewer lights more carefully to ensure maximum effect. Think of lighting in terms of "layers," creating a background, foreground and focal points. (The design principle of contrast applies.)

Avoid glare. Light should never shine directly into eyes or across property lines. In fact, make very effort to keep light contained below the horizontal plane (such fixtures are commonly called “full cutoff”).

A perforated downlight creates a “starlight” effect in this Atherton landscape.

If you must uplight an object such as a tree or wall, be sure all light lands on the object rather than shining off into space. Many cities such as Los Altos Hills, Portola Valley, Woodside, and Atherton regulate this, with “dark-sky” ordinances that reduce light pollution to improve stargazing (as well as general quality of life).

You’ll find perfectly competent “plug and play” lighting systems at big-box hardware stores. But if you're just installing a new landscape—or have more complex needs than some simple uplighting or downlighting—consider hiring a landscape architect or lighting designer.

These professionals can envision your present needs and anticipate your future ones; and they can also leverage their relationships with lighting manufacturers to arrange for "previews" of your system, to fine-tune locations and effects before final installation.

Ultimately, the money you invest in their expertise will more than pay for itself in terms of peace of mind and overall effect.

Good luck, and good night!