Top 5 Tips Lighting up your Exterior

Whilst's it's winter at the time of writing, now is the time to plan your outdoor spaces for the arrival of Spring and the warmer months ahead. 

In this blog post, we’ll go over five tips for optimising the lighting for your home’s outdoor spaces, whether that’s adding wall lights to your outdoor desk or verandah or installing landscape lighting in your garden to accentuate your trees and shrubs.

1. Create an outdoor space
If you don’t already have a specific area designed to cater to your outdoor relaxation needs, we suggest creating one, as this is where exterior home lighting solutions really have their chance to shine. (get it, "shine" :)) 

2. Frame your front door with wall lights
For the most welcoming front door ambiance, we suggest installing wall lights to the frame of your entryway front door. Or, if you typically prefer overhead lighting, you can hang a beautiful outdoor pendant from above your porch area. Make sure any style if rated for Australian outdoor use. 

These exterior home lighting solutions will provide sufficient lighting for your guests when it’s dark outside, and you can get as personalised as you want with the wall lighting fixtures you choose to really showcase the personality of your home.

3. Utilise landscape lights
Landscape lights are perfect for illuminating the lively plants and trees in the front yard and backyard of your home. If you have a flower garden you want to show off or simply want to illuminate any shadows cast by these natural plants in your front yard, you can install a variety of landscape lighting solutions.

We recommend getting outdoor spotlights, landscape water lights, or lights for your deck or stairs. SMITH&SMITH doesn't publish outdoor lighting on our web site, but contact us for available options.

4. Use LED lighting solutions
LED lighting is an attractive option - both for indoor and outdoor lighting - and for good reason. They are energy efficient and maintenance-free so you won’t have to change out bulbs as often or have as high of energy costs as you would with traditional halogen or incandescent light bulbs.

5. Hang your lighting fixtures, if possible.
Any opportunity to hang a lighting fixture is a great opportunity. When you hang your lighting fixtures outside, you’re not only creating beautiful lighting functionality, you’re also adding elegance and your own characteristic flair to an outdoor space that typically doesn’t have unique lighting solutions.

You can hang your lights from ceilings, if possible, or from structures in your outdoor spaces that allow for enough walking space underneath the structure.

Need assistance with your outdoor lighting ideas? Contact SMITH&SMITH today.