At Nancy B’s House of Lights, we help provide landscape lighting design for residential properties in Charlottesville and Albemarle. Properly installed landscape lighting can provide a safe and well-lit entrance to your home, while also enhancing the beauty of your landscaping.
The first step in installing landscape lighting is to consult with an electrician, who can determine what wiring is needed. Landscape lighting is offered in 120 volt and 12 volts. When using 120V, a trench is dug 18” deep into the ground for placement of the wire, no transformer is needed, and the fixtures are usually less in price. Lov voltage or 12V wiring can be placed 6 to 8” in the ground and easily moved if plants become too large or cover the fixtures, requires a transformer and the fixtures are a little more. However, the 12V saves energy and money in the long run.
While the electrician can provide recommendations on where to place the lighting based on wiring and can install the fixtures once they are purchased, at Nancy B’s we provide design assistance with positioning of the lights in the landscape. We can help you with placement, aesthetics, and understanding the different types of lighting effects on your landscaping.
There are many landscape lighting techniques available to create different effects, such as:
- Silhouetting: Backlighting an object to dramatize it. The light is placed between the object and the house, creating a silhouette of the object.
- Wall washing: Illuminating a wall or surface to create a soft wash of light.
- Shadowing: Placing a light in front of an object to project a shadow onto a surface behind the object.
- Uplighting: Illuminating an area, surface, or object from below to create a focal point.
- Grazing: Emphasizing a textured surface, such as a tree trunk or stone wall, by placing a light within one foot of the surface.
Spotlights are most commonly used to create the above effects. Specific fixtures are used to emphasize steps, decks, patios, and other outdoor features. Pendant and chandelier options are also available for outdoor use and exterior fans can be added to make your outside space more comfortable and inviting.
We can also provide expertise for other factors concerning outdoor lighting fixtures, such as leaves, snow, and potential damage from mowers, weed eaters, or teenage drivers.
Sometimes clients have technical questions or needs that we cannot address, that is when we call in the “big dogs”, our product representatives. These reps specialize in a few specific product lines and are highly knowledgeable. They can often bring a lighting fixture to the job site to demonstrate the fixture, as well as provide information about light output and other technical details.
Contact Us today to learn more about our landscape lighting services or to schedule a consultation with one of our lighting experts.
