Look at this beautiful yard, majestically swaying in the soft breeze of a warm autumn night in Southern California.

 

 

Wait, what are we looking at? Let’s turn the lights on!

 

 

Ah, yes, the welcoming glow of home.

 

 

Landscape lighting adds a dramatic flair to your property while illuminating dark areas, providing safe lighted pathways for you, your family, and your guests. Landscape lighting also extends the enjoyment of your yard late into the evening on those warm summer nights, or those chilly winter nights (especially if you have a firepit to gather around).

Creative Concepts Landscape installs, checks, and repairs landscape lighting for all needs, whether it’s aesthetics, safety, security, or most often, a combination of all.

Our lighting philosophy follows the landscape’s features, illuminating the natural beauty of the plant’s structures, hardscape’s textures and geometry, the rolls and slopes of the earth, while also showcasing the architectural design of your home.

 

The Practicality & Beaty of Landscape Lighting

 

Yes, landscape lighting will add evening beauty to your property, highlighting the unique silhouettes of trees and plants, however it also has practical purposes.

 

Your path forward, illuminated

 

Pathlights guide the way, allowing you and your family to safely follow walkways. They also play an important role in visually incorporating the transitional area between the path and the landscape features along that path.

 

As you step along the beautiful stone walkway, hand in hand with your young daughter, admiring the subtle curvature of the individual stones casting gentle shadows upon each other, you notice the delicate yet unified leafing structure of the groundcover plants as they, like you two, together, follow the path home.

 

Path lighting

 

Uplights illuminate the beautiful textures of trees and shrubs along with their branching structures. Often placed toward the base or lower trunk of a tree, these lights cast complex shadows up the tree or plant, creating a stunning structural effect.

 

On a cool spring evening, you step outside after an exhausting day at work. The sun has set and the landscape lights that Creative Concepts Landscape recently installed turn on (because they were installed with a timer, you have one less thing to concern yourself with remembering to do).

 

The beautiful Italian stone pine, planted by hands generations ago and now passed on to you, becomes illuminated. You see the branching structure, the powerful limbs reaching for the sky, finding different paths in their effort to grow forth. Like those who planted this tree knowing that future generations will enjoy it, you find strength knowing that you too are building something sturdy for your family and loved ones.

 

Uplights on a mature pine tree

 

 

Downlights operate in a similar way to uplights, but in the opposite direction. These lights, placed in higher locations, cast shadows across the ground and low growing plants.

 

For her entire life, she found a place of inner peace and strength remembering the beautiful shadows of the large front yard trees of her parents’ home. The shadows delicately walked across the lawn, lighted from the canopies. The house itself, with downlights from the eaves, welcomed her home.

 

Decades later, the memory still welcomes her home, no matter where she goes. “Who installed those lights?” She wondered. Creative Concepts Landscape install them, and, yes, we are still at it.

 

A combination of various lighting techniques

 

Spotlights have a narrower beam, often illuminating a feature at a greater distance, which will beautifully highlight the silhouette of individual plants or garden structures, such as boulders.

 

It’s Thursday night, and his eyes were growing tired of the television’s cold glow. The forecast said a storm is coming and he can hear the wind beginning to growl through the trees. Is he worried? He walks out into the backyard to check on everything. The landscape lights are on, he can see his property.

 

Suddenly a dancing figure catches his eye. No, he’s not worried, he knows exactly what it is. The landscape lighting system included a spotlight, which illuminates the young sycamore tree in the corner. The leaves and branches, shadows projected upon his redwood fence, wave with the wind. The warm light sooths his eyes.

 

Creative Concepts Landscape had installed the lighting system years ago, and they had recently come by for one of their periodic checks. The storm will come, but he went to sleep that night with ease.

 

 

Shadows on adjacent walls and fences add a dramatic effect to the landscape

 

Floodlights cast a wider beam for a shorter distance. These lights can illuminate whole areas, making open sections of the property more visible.

 

It was his high school graduation and his parents agreed to let him throw a party for his friends. They even helped organize it, knowing they had a great space for guests (because they liked to have their friends over too). Of particular usefulness were the floodlights, set up to illuminate the backyard lawn.

 

The tables were set, the food was served, and there was even dancing going on under the stars. It was a nighttime party atmosphere with daylight visibility. He was lost in the fun of the moment, as it should be, but his parents proudly looked on. The kids are alright. There was no question about the landscape lighting investment they had made with Creative Concepts Landscape.

 

Glowing lights, illuminating the lawn and adjacent plants

 

For those who are more security minded, landscape lighting will also brighten dark areas of the property. Although Creative Concepts Landscape does not install security alarm systems, landscape lighting can act in a similar way. Light always deters those who do not want to be seen.

 

The Art of Lighting

Landscape lighting is equal parts art and science. Of course, there are the technical needs of the actual installation. Creative Concepts Landscape has you covered on that. Our team of lighting technicians will do all the work needed to make sure your landscape lighting system is operating well, but beyond that, landscape lighting installation is about balance and contrast.

 

There are many ways to light a yard. What features do you want to emphasis? What shadows can be cast and onto what surfaces? It’s a complex artform and we are here to paint your property with light.

 

A dry landscape creek, illuminated by painterly light

 

The intersection of beauty and functionality is what humans specialize in (when we are at our best). Landscape lighting is certainly functional; however, the creative side is not to be ignored. Lighting is a play of physics, a dance of dimension that speaks the dazzling language of photons.

 

What am I talking about? Let’s take a look lighting the way it is supposed to be enjoyed, not by description, but with our eyes. To help us we will take a look at the artful lighting installation at the Los Angeles Zoo and Botanical Gardens’ gorgeous show, LA Zoo Lights.

 

LA and palm trees – what more can we say?

 

The electric flamingo

 

The electric ficus (one of the more spectacular, if lesser known, tropical plants)

 

 

Lighting Contracts with Creative Concepts Landscape

 

Lighting systems, like irrigation and plant care, needs periodic maintenance to keep it working efficiently and properly. Creative Concepts Landscape not only installs landscape lighting systems, but we also maintain them.

Whether or not we installed the system, we will put together a plan for periodic checks and repairs of your landscape lighting.  Each property is different, and each lighting system takes particular care. Let us keep your lighting system looking beautiful and functioning efficiently and safely.

 

Contact us today to set up a consultation for landscape lighting installation, lighting repairs or optimization, and system checks.

 

 

Creative Concepts Landscape will keep your lighting system in optimal condition with our periodic service checks.

 

 

By Daniel Williams

Client Liaison for Creative Concepts Landscape Management