Your walkways are such an important part of your North Texas property. They help you safely navigate from point A to point B.
Whether it’s heading from your vehicle to your front door or even from your front yard to your backyard, it’s important to you that your family and guests can get around safely.
Of course, in order to keep your walkways highly functional, outdoor pathway lighting is critical. The nighttime hours are when navigating walkways can become more challenging.
In order to get the most out of outdoor walkway lighting, it’s important that it is both a functional and aesthetic addition.
In this article, we will discuss outdoor walkway lighting ideas that will help add value to your home.
When most people think about outdoor walkway lighting, they think of a bunch of path lights lined up along a walkway. While that’s certainly one way to light up a walkway, it’s important to recognize that it’s not the only way.
In fact, sometimes lining up a bunch of path lights can look overdone. When this occurs, you risk your outdoor walkway lighting looking more like an airport runway than an aesthetic addition to your property.
You aren’t trying to land a plane, you just want to make sure people can get around your property safely. For this reason, proper spacing is really important.
Or, even better, you might want to consider another way to light up your walkways such as downlighting. With downlighting, we can mount lights in the trees above your walkway and cast light downward so that you can see where you’re going.
This is a more subtle way to light the walkway. It is also sometimes called “moonlighting” as the light cast downward mimics moonlight.
While we love coming up with other ways to light pathways beyond traditional path lights, that’s not to say that they can’t still be part of your outdoor pathway lighting design. It’s just important to keep in mind that there are many beautiful ways to light a pathway.
Also, keep in mind that the cheap solar-powered path lights sold at the local hardware store are NOT the same thing that a professional will be using in a landscape lighting installation in North Texas. Even if you do go the path light route, you want something high quality.
As you think about outdoor path lighting ideas, keep in mind that lights can actually be installed into the pathway itself.
These core-drilled marker lights are built right into the walkway, allowing people to see exactly where to go with each step. It’s almost like a subtle “guide” showing you what lies ahead.
Sometimes we use a combination of built-in lights and stand-alone path lights, depending on how dark it is and how much the path needs to be lit. Core-drilled marker lights also work well with steps (an area that we’ll talk about next).
When it comes to lighting your walkways, you need to pay special attention to any steps. That’s because these pose the greatest trip and fall risk (by far). At nighttime, missing even a single step can lead to an injury.
Lighting up steps can be attractive when done right. Again, you don’t have to overdo it. It’s all about finding the right balance between aesthetics and functionality. The key is to make sure that the steps are well-seen so that nobody falls.
Just like a pathway, steps can be lit with downlighting (shining from trees above). But homeowners often also like the idea of building lighting right into the steps. This illuminates them in an attractive and functional way as you can see steps coming up from afar.
You might also want to consider rail lighting. This can be installed underneath the side of a railing so that people can see exactly where they should hold on in order to navigate the stairs safely.
Oftentimes, pathways have retaining walls incorporated (either alongside the path or close enough to help become part of the lighting solution).
If this is the case, it poses an opportunity to integrate lights into the wall. Lights built into a wall can be used to shine down on a path and provide valuable illumination. Sometimes part of the struggle is where to install lights so that they are truly an aesthetic addition. Walls help achieve this.
If you have a stone wall, you might find that adding lighting is an incredibly aesthetic addition. The lights will cast beautiful shadows and help your wall take on a unique look in the nighttime hours.
At the end of the day, outdoor walkway lighting is just one part of an entire outdoor lighting design. In order to get the most out of your entire design, it’s important to partner with the right landscape lighting company.
Landscape lighting can be a relatively substantial investment in your property. But with the right design, it can be one that pays off greatly. With something as important as pathway lighting, it makes a direct contribution to the safety of your property.
But there’s no doubt that it boosts your curb appeal, too.
Great lighting is skillfully and purposely laid out and designed using the highest quality materials. The truth is, even some “pros” do not maintain a high standard when it comes to creating the highest quality landscape lighting design.
But when you make a wise choice, you can feel confident that you’re going to get a great design as well as peace of mind that you’re protected if anything comes up.
We care deeply that our clients get the most out of their North Texas properties both day and night. With the best choice in professional landscape lighting, that’s exactly what you can expect.
If you’d like to find out more about landscape lighting installers in Flower Mound, Highland Village, or Lewisville, TX, you can visit the Outdoor Lighting Perspectives website or contact us at Grassperson.
