Practical and beautiful landscape lighting design ideas for homeowners.

Good landscape lighting design is both practical and beautiful. If you design your outdoor lighting system carefully, your patio, deck and garden will have a beautiful, magical ambience at night, and your outdoor spaces will be a lot safer and more secure as well.

There is a fantastic array of products available for landscape lighting designers and creative homeowners, including floodlights, spotlights, accent lighting fixtures, pathway lights, decorative lanterns and pond lights. Each radiates a different quality of light, and each is designed for a specific landscape lighting purpose. Some landscape lighting fixtures serve as magnificent sculptural landscape design elements in themselves. Just follow the links from this site for lots of great landscape lighting ideas.

Outdoor lighting design tips.

Designing your outdoor lighting system can be a fairly complex process, and there will always be an element of trial and error involved, so don’t be afraid to experiment a little. Before you mount your lighting fixtures, set them up where you think they should go and turn them on. You’ll know straight away whether or not your design ideas have worked. If you don’t like the effect, just move them until you get your lighting design just right, then mount the fixtures permanently.

When you’re deciding where to place your landscape lighting fixtures, it’s very important to avoid creating glare. Make sure your lights aren’t shining directly against a hard surface, as this will create a harsh, uncomfortable effect. Where possible, place the lighting fixtures where they will be hidden from view. Try to design the lighting system so that there is an even, ambient glow around the space, with no hot spots. If you wish to draw focus to a particular landscaping feature like an ornament or a special plant or tree, use an accent light or spot light.