Landscape Lighting 101
Tis the season! To climb around the garage looking for the box marked "x-mas", pulling it out and taking a big deep breath in. Untangle the string lights, test the bulbs, replace the bulbs, test the bulbs again, map out your route and set up that ladder! If this doesn’t sound like fun to you, step off that ladder and follow us, we’ve got a better option to lighting up your home this season and all year round.
Landscape Lighting
Instead of using holiday lighting try landscape lighting. Landscape lighting will compliment your home all year long and it only requires a one time setup. Depending on your bulb choice, you can get around 50,000 hours of light and when set up on a timer, even longer! And when you want to join the festivities, it's as easy as switching out a few light bulbs.
Inspiring Lighting
There are many places you can add lighting to your outdoor space. Sometimes all we need is a little inspiration to open up our imagination. Below are a few inspirational photos to help you think of your home in a ‘new light’. 
The Garden - Gardens lights are great for entertaining in the backyard and for creating a landscape view from inside your home at night. When placing landscape lighting in your garden not only are you able to experience your garden for longer hours of the day but you're also going to create pops of colour that aren’t visible in the sunlight. As seen above, up lighting is a technique used to create vibrant colors by placing a light underneath your plant’s foliage. This looks especially beautiful with deciduous plants that glow vibrant reds, greens and yellows.
The Front Yard - Lighting at the front of your home is a great way to increase security, provide lighting for guests and highlighting accent trees. As mentioned earlier in this article, front yard landscape lighting is also a great way to save time and energy during the holidays. After a one time installation, you can get creative by changing lights to reflect holiday colours or spotlight holiday décor like wreaths or reindeer to put them on display.
The Pond - If you're lucky enough to have a pond, pond lights are a must. They’re a safe, non-invasive method to highlighting a water feature that could save humans and wildlife from falling in in the dark. Pond lighting is a great choice for keeping an eye on sneaky critters who steal fish and the lights create a calm rippling effect with a beautiful reflection.
Walkway/Backyard - Placing your lights along a walkway is a safe way to keep an eye on all traffic, coming and going. It's great for your guests to safely find their way. There are several methods to placing your walkway lights, but we really enjoy up lighting on trees. Placing your lights from the bark upwards will create a more visible walkway, with a view. From a distance, your trees will create additional accent lighting to better compliment your home and landscape.
What You Need
If you're interested in creating a night display of your own there are a few items you will need to get the job done. First you should determined what your landscaping objective is and then you will need to decide how much effort you're willing to put in. Solar lights are a great option for the easiest method. However, there likely isn't enough natural sunlight available to power these lights in dark spaces (like under your plants). If you're interested in creating a more grand and customized look, you will need to purchase lighting fixtures, stands/stakes, a transformer, LED bulbs and timer. If you choose to create your own display with individually purchased products, be sure to purchase waterproof products and speak to an expert.
Kits
The most affordable and easy option for landscape lighting are outdoor lighting kits. They are affordable, easy and customizable. Outdoor lighting kits include everything you need in order to create the outdoor atmosphere of your dreams. The kit we carry captures everything you need to get started on pond and garden lighting. 
Garden and Pond LED spotlight kit by Aquascapes.
Ask Gord
Whether you're new to outdoor landscape lighting or you're an expert, there are always ways to change your displays. Creating something new and exciting each and every time. Need more inspiration? Check out what our President Gord has to say below about adding lighting to your pots, plants and trees.
