Transform Your Trees With Ottawa Outdoor Lighting

Trees play an important role in any landscape design. From the placement to the pruning, trees add dimension, depth, and drama to a yard. And that’s just during the day! Incorporating Ottawa outdoor lighting into your landscape design will help enhance the look of your landscape – and bring attention to the many trees in your yard – in an engaging manner.

Planning Your Outdoor Tree Lighting Project
Before lighting any trees in your yard with Ottawa outdoor lighting, you’ll need to sit down and plan out your attack. This involves assessing the size, structure, shape, texture, and position of the trees currently growing in your yard. You’ll want to be selective about which ones you light; not all trees are suited to outdoor illumination, after all. Make note of any tree that is structurally sound and undamaged. These will look the best when highlighted at night.

Things to Consider When Lighting a Tree
There are a number of things that our Ottawa outdoor lighting experts need to consider when illuminating a tree. These include:

• Viewing Distance
  The distance and angle at which people will be viewing the tree is one of the first things our lighting experts consider when laying out a system. A quick rule of thumb: trees that are positioned further away will require more light that those positioned closer to the viewer. This helps ensure that your trees don’t fade into the distance.
  
  
• Canopy Colouring
  If you want to make the most of your tree lighting (and of course you do!) you’ll need to update your bulb selection seasonally. This is because lighter coloured foliage reflects light much easier than darker canopies. As such, dimmer bulbs often offer adequate lighting for trees during the spring and summer months. Come autumn you’ll want to use brighter lights, as the darker foliage will absorb a great deal of the light.
  
  
• Positioning
  Trees are commonly lit in one of two ways: either from outside the canopy or from within. The size, shape, and density of a tree’s canopy will dictate which technique makes the most sense. A tree with an open canopy can be up-lit from the base of the tree. Denser trees should be lit from outside of the canopy in order to reflect off of the foliage.
  
  
• Tree Size
  Bigger isn’t always better when deciding on which trees to light with your Ottawa outdoor lighting system. This is because smaller trees often require a much lower light output. A low voltage, LED landscape lighting system will illuminate these trees with ease.

Tree Lighting Effects to Consider
How you light the trees in your yard can have a big impact on the overall ambiance of your property. Silhouetting, for example, will create a bright and dramatic outline around the perimeter of a tree’s shape. Mounting fixtures on a tree’s branch and casting the light down will create a subtle moonlighting effect that’s mysteriously haunting. Finally, if your property features some small trees positioned against a plain wall, consider placing a spotlight fixture in front of the tree for a shadowed effect. This will add an interesting layer of texture to your lighting design.

Choosing Your Fixtures
The Ottawa outdoor lighting experts at Landscape Lighting highly recommend working with stake mounted and recessed outdoor lighting fixtures when it comes to illuminating trees. These fixtures will provide you with the greatest amount of flexibility and light span.

Add depth to your Ottawa outdoor lighting design with tree illuminating techniques from Landscape Lighting. Contact our office today to learn more about this important aspect of outdoor lighting design.