LED Lights for Landscaping

Adding LED lights for landscaping can easily add drama and accentuate your home’s features. It also provides security through more visibility of your outdoors. After all, you spend a lot of time and money on improving a house’s appeal. You can highlight them both day and night by using LED lights.

There is a large selection of lights, from spotlights for spotlighting statues and fountains to floodlights for showcasing a home’s façade to spotlights for illuminating mature trees. The guide reviews the top LED landscape lighting on the market and discusses which features to consider while shopping.

LED Landscape Lighting: What to Consider

The type of lights, power source, location, and weather resistance are all important factors to consider when choosing the right lighting for your residential property. Here’s what you should consider:

• Bulb Type

When it comes to energy efficiency, bulb type makes a big difference. LED bulbs are best for landscape lighting. It uses about 80 percent less electricity than incandescent bulbs and is brighter. Furthermore, they burn cooler and last much longer than incandescent bulbs.

They are, however, three or four times more expensive than incandescent bulbs. Although these bulbs are more expensive initially, their long lifespan and energy efficiency make them worth it.

• Power Source

In order to run LED lights for your outdoors, you will need a transformer that converts standard 120-volt electricity to 12-volt electricity. Lighting fittings connected to a transformer are able to run on 12-volt systems.

LED landscape lighting systems do not present a risk of electric shock since 12-volt electricity is not a dangerous current. Additionally, the user can run the wires across the top of the ground rather than burying them in the ground under a thin layer of dirt or mulch.

The solar-powered LED light source is another option. A small solar cell powers a battery that provides power to the lights at night using solar energy. It’s easier to install because it doesn’t require wiring. It relies on the battery that charges throughout the day. It is capable of providing lighting for 8-12 hours when fully charged. You should ensure that solar-powered landscape lighting receives at least 6 hours of direct sunlight per day in order to fully recharge.

• Brightness

Landscape lights have different brightnesses based on their type and power source. By using a 12-volt transformer to power a bullet light, you can produce approximately 1,500 lumens, enough to illuminate the exterior of a house. Lights for wells, which are great for uplighting a tree or wall, produce around 100 lumens, while LED lights for gardens often produce between 200 and 300 lumens.

Landscape lighting powered by a 12-volt transformer generates more lumens than solar lighting. In comparison to a solar-powered pathway light, a 12-volt pathway light generates 150 lumens.

• Color Temperature

Landscape lights come in a variety of colors, in addition to brightness. Its color temperature ranges from warm white to daylight, and it has an effect on the look and feel of lighting. This is measured by the Kelvin scale (K). There is generally a range of lighting temperatures from 2,000K to 6,500K in homes, with the lower temperature being warmer and the higher temperature being cooler. When lit at 2,500K, the room feels cozy and warm, but it gives a daylight feel at 5,000K.

Despite enhancing visibility at night, nighttime landscape lighting should not be as prominent as the lighting of a concert stage. The color temperature of landscape lighting should be between 2,000K and 3,000K to provide a more nuanced effect.

Weather Resistance

The lighting system for landscapes must withstand outdoor elements. Because aluminum is naturally corrosion-resistant, most landscape lighting is made from aluminum. In addition, it’s tough enough to withstand a few accidental impacts from feet, trimmer lines, or lawnmowers. There are some landscape lighting fixtures that use shock-resistant tempered glass, such as well lights.

Electrical wiring is used in LED landscaping. Thus, it needs to be water-resistant and impact-resistant. In outdoor electrical devices, a measure of the device’s protection from dust and water is measured using an International Protection Code (IP code). Lighting installed on LED or solar landscapes should have an IP 65 rating or higher, meaning it will not be affected by dust particles or dripping water, as with a sprinkler or hard rain.

Landscape lighting with an IP 67 rating, such as those hidden in wells, means that they can be submerged temporarily in water.

Size and Style

• Garden

Unlike traditional landscape lighting, garden lighting is mounted on a post 18-24 inches high and has a canopy shade that reflects the light downward. This creates a pool of light just beneath the fixture. They are perfect for illuminating flower beds or marking pathways.

• Wash

Wash lights brighten broad areas, such as the sides of homes, walls, or fences. The light is projected upward and mounted near the base of the structure.

Bullet

Basically, bullet lights are spotlights that direct narrow beams of light to illuminate specific features, such as the trunk of a tree or a decorative element on a home. The beamwidth of a bullet light is measured in degrees. The lower the degrees, the narrower and brighter.

• Well

The well lights illuminate a tree’s branches from the base of the ground. The facade of the home can also be illuminated by installing them near the foundation.

• Downlight

These lights are mounted in trees or on the side of the house and create moonlight-like shadows on the lawn, patio, or pathway below. The cylindrical shade of these fixtures prevents side glare by covering the bulb.

• Floodlight

A floodlight like this is typically mounted to an eave of a home as a security or visibility measure. Lighting floodlights create a wide wash of light that covers a large area. Ideally suited for illumination of houses, walls, or fences. These lights have a brighter effect than washes.

Location

• Facade

Even when the sun sets, curb appeal can still be seen. It is possible to add drama and sophistication to a property by installing floodlights and washes.

• Trees

Uplighting or downlighting can be beneficial to trees. In downlighting, the branches are illuminated by the moonlight. Shadows created by this type of lighting are particularly dramatic when they appear beneath tree branches, on walks, and on driveways. Uplighting can add drama to a large tree and highlight its textures and foliage.

• Gardens and beds

Garden lights are an effective way to showcase low flowers and plants in garden beds at night. Make your garden lights tall enough to cast light down onto the foliage below, so they cast light down onto the plants.

• Backyard patios

Tree-mounted lights that shine downward are ideal for backyard patios surrounded by trees. By placing the light high in the trees, the light will produce more nuanced lighting that is ideal for entertaining at night as well as creating interesting shadows and textures from the foliage of the trees.

• Lawn ornaments

Light up specific architectural features on a home, like a statue, water fountain, etc., with a bullet light.

Installation

Upgrade your landscaped property with Landscape Improvement’s outdoor lighting installation and service. Over the past three decades, we have earned the trust of our fellow Floridians.

Your outdoor living space can be transformed into a beautiful oasis with the right lighting combinations. The outdoor lighting we offer is suitable for any type of feature, whether it’s a pathway, pond, or foliage. Do you want more details?

Contact us today!