If you own a home in North Idaho, you want to enjoy the beauty of this land year-round — and in the summertime, that means getting outside as much as possible. Is your backyard optimized to be the space you've always dreamed of? What could make it even more inviting for relaxing, entertaining, or working on your hobbies?
With summer comes extended hours of daylight. But when the sun dips below the horizon, does your outdoor lifestyle fade into the dark night, too? The right lighting for your landscape, deck, and dock extends your outdoor living area into the evening, making it a fun, safe space you can enjoy any time of day.
Before designing a lighting plan for your home's exterior, decks, pathways, or dock, think about how you want your space to look and be used. The right lighting enhances the aesthetics, increases the functionality, and unlocks new uses for the space.
Aesthetics
The style and placement of lighting fixtures has a tremendous impact on the appearance of your home. Fixture style (modern, rustic, farmhouse, industrial) provides a finishing touch, and placement — casting light up, down, in front, or behind — can strategically highlight features of your home and landscape.
Functionality
No one will use a dark space at night. By simply adding lighting, you create usable space. Consider brighter, more numerous lights in large deck and patio spaces where you'll want seating or tables. And don't forget the connecting paths and walkways — lighting is an important part of safety as well as connecting one space to another.
Usability and convenience
Think about how you want to use your outdoor space throughout the day, and use lighting to get the most out of it. If you have a dock and love to fish, you'll want to make sure the path is well lit to walk out on. You may want to install green lights under the dock to attract more fish: the green light shining into the water attracts plankton, which attract bait fish, which attract your game fish. Or if you love to get out on the water with your boat, you can program your canopy and dock lights to come on as you arrive — giving you a well-lit path home.
The right lights in the right places will make sure you get the most enjoyment out of your home's outdoor living areas.