Decorative Outdoor Lighting Fixtures

When building a new home, remodeling your existing house or landscaping the yard, you should not overlook the possibilities and benefits of outdoor lighting. Outdoor lighting is a fantastic way to enhance the nighttime vista of your yard, expand the boundaries of your home and provide security lighting for your family. A well designed outdoor lighting system should incorporate many types of lights such as security lights, flood lights, step lights, decorative lanterns, landscape lights, barbeque lights as well as provisions for seasonal lighting.

Security lights are the foundation of any outdoor lighting plan. These outdoor lighting fixtures are typically mounted on the house, near doorways, garages or areas where you feel extra light will give you peace of mind. These outdoor lighting fixtures used in combination with switches, photocells and timers are a must have for any home. Halogen lamps are well suited for landscape lighting because they will turn off and on without delay. HID light sources, such as metal halide, mercury vapor and high pressure sodium require a warm up to reach full intensity and will not re-strike if accidentally turned off. For that reason, HID sources are not good for security lighting unless you remove the switch and leave them on all night.

Landscape lighting is an artistic form of outdoor lighting that enhances trees, plants, structures or other architectural elements of your home and garden. Outdoor lighting adds to the value of your home and will give you years of enjoyment. Outdoor landscape lighting comes in many forms and should be discussed with your landscape architect or builder. They can put you in contact with a landscape lighting professional who can educate you on low voltage and line voltage lighting systems.

Most homes have either electric or gas lanterns at the front door for outdoor lighting. Electric lanterns should be used on a nightly basis to provide your guests with a sense of welcome and guide them to the door. It is best to use a dimmer control on your lanterns so that they can be dimmed for balance, yet turned up when necessary. If you are using gas lanterns, remember to install a recessed light over the door. Gas lights are beautiful, but they are inadequate for seeing who is at the door. Just about every home has an outdoor grill or barbeque pit that is used at night. Often times, outdoor lights for grills or outdoor kitchens are overlooked and may be difficult or impossible to add after the fact.

The last thing on your mind when building your dream home is providing outdoor lighting for holidays or Christmas. But now is the time to provide adequate circuits, receptacles and timers to automate your system. Just think how nice it will be to plug in the twinkle lights, net lights, and outdoor yard art without running extension cords or blowing the fuse.Barbeque lights that clip or mount to your grill are a very practical way to illuminate the cooking surface and provide a good working light. Barbeque lights come in many shapes, voltages and sizes to fit any décor.