Start with how you use the garden

Before choosing fittings, walk around the yard at night. Where do people actually go? The path from the carport to the back door, the steps down to the lawn, the gate to the pool, the bins. Light those routes first. Once the practical lighting is sorted, add a few features for atmosphere.

It also helps to look at your garden from inside. A lit tree or garden bed outside a living room window turns a black glass rectangle into a view.

Ideas that work well

Path lights: low bollards or mushroom-style lights that throw light down onto the path rather than into your eyes.
Step lights: small fittings set into retaining walls or stair risers so every step is visible.
Uplights: spike lights angled up into a tree trunk or canopy. Frangipanis, palms and gums all look great lit from below.
Wall washers: soft light grazing a textured fence or sandstone wall.
Deck lights: small lights in deck boards or under the edge of steps.
Festoon lighting: strings of globes over an entertaining area, ideally on their own switch.

Less is usually more

A common mistake is lighting everything evenly, which ends up looking like a car park. Leave some areas dark. Contrast is what makes a lit garden look good. A few well-placed lights usually beat a dozen spread across every bed.

Warm white generally suits gardens best. Cooler light can make plants look washed out.

Low voltage or 240 volt

Many garden lighting kits run at extra-low voltage through a transformer, typically 12 volts. Fittings are small, the cable is easier to run and they're flexible if you change your garden around. The transformer itself still needs to be connected to power properly and placed somewhere protected from the weather.

Full 240 volt garden lighting is brighter and suits bigger yards, but the cabling needs to be installed to the wiring rules, with correct depth, protection and conduit. That's licensed electrical work. Either way, it's worth getting an electrician involved early so the power supply, switching and safety switch protection are all planned.

Cable runs and digging

Plan the cable route before planting or laying pavers. Running conduit under a new path is easy. Digging up a finished path is not. If you're doing landscaping, ask the landscaper to leave conduit in place where lights will go, and we can pull cables through later.

Watch out for irrigation lines, gas and water pipes when digging. Dial Before You Dig, now called Before You Dig Australia, is a free service for locating underground utilities.

Switching and control

Garden lights on a simple wall switch work fine. Many people prefer a timer, a light sensor or smart control from an app so the lights come on at dusk without anyone thinking about it. Smart switches and app-controlled lights also let you set different scenes, such as path lights only on a weeknight and everything on when friends are over. We set up smart lighting as part of our smart home work, so it can all be sorted in one visit.

Doing the whole outdoor area at once

If you're also adding a pool, outdoor kitchen or power points, it's efficient to do everything in one go. See our pool and outdoor power page. Customers have told us they had power for a new pool and garden lights done together, which saved digging twice.

Talk to us about your garden

Our outdoor and security lighting page has more on what we do. Send Kalani a few photos of the yard, ideally one in daylight and one at night, and we'll suggest a simple plan.

Call or text 0424 400 346.

Garden and path lighting ideas