Garden Lighting – light and shade

With a little imagination and some subtle design work, any garden can be bathed in a warm glow of lighting that is both atmospheric and functional.

There is a more subtle garden lighting solution than the driveway security light which blinds you on approach, or casts such deep shadow along the driveway sides and borders that nothing is clearly visible. Incorporating a series of pavement lights that illuminate the driveway surface and pick out the surface texture will illuminate the whole drive without being blinded. Add to this an LED uplighter sited under a tree or next to a wall, and the result is ambient light that will show the entire setting without the deep shade – and as a bonus, your home looks fabulous!

There are so many different ways to light a garden, that it is impossible to describe all of them. The best illustration is to imagine a garden as a theatre, with all the garden lighting possibilities that this can offer. You can have several circuits to light different areas of the garden, or create changes in mood. You can even have the lights change as you wander through your garden, illuminating what comes next, and dying down as you pass by. One important consideration is that there is little or no need for coloured lamps. There should be enough colour contained in the garden and the ambient light created should be colourful enough.

There is one simple question to see if your garden is correctly lit. What can you see more of as you walk round the garden, the blinding brightness of the lamp, or the light cast? If you see more of the latter and less of the former, then you are well on the way to a perfectly lit garden.

Why not take a look at all of our projects and see if we can inspire you?