Light Up Your Driveway with These Outdoor Lighting Ideas in Naperville, IL

The driveway is rarely seen as a key design element in the landscape. Often, the driveway is treated as just a place to park your car. However, it can potentially be so much more dynamic with the addition of some intelligent lighting strategies. First and foremost, your driveway needs to be safe. From there, you want to take a layered approach that will help showcase the true beauty of the surrounding landscape at night. During your landscape renovation, make sure to light up your driveway with these outdoor lighting ideas in Naperville, IL.

Choose LEDs

Whichever lighting strategy you adopt, be sure to choose light-emitting diodes (LEDs). LEDs are at the forefront of lighting technology and will have some wonderful benefits for your driveway and overall landscape. These powerful lights use far less energy than their traditional light bulb counterparts. They’ll also require significantly fewer replacements over time and fit in tight spaces.

Choose Layered Lighting

Instead of an old-school single light source (such as a garage-mounted flood light), choosing multiple lighting strategies will yield the most attractive and practical result. Avoid flood lights because they deliver a bright, garish light that can be blinding; and by contrast, the surrounding landscape will appear pitch black and unwelcoming. While the immediate area will be extremely well lit, a single light source will inevitably create harsh shadows that can block tripping hazards.

Instead of focusing on the driveway, you can place a few solar powered path lights randomly throughout the landscape. These lights will help create a visual texture that will give dimension to the landscape. It will also improve the safety and security of your landscape by eliminating dark spots.

An Array of Path Lights

Path lights are well loved by landscapers and homeowners alike as excellent sources of attractive and welcoming driveway illumination. These lights are situated low to the ground, which focuses their energy much more efficiently. This approach can reduce the need for bright high-wattage light bulbs. It also eliminates the possibility of blinding someone as they walk or drive.

Path lights can be either hooked up to the electrical grid using underground wires, or you can opt for solar-powered path lights which will charge during the daytime and stay on all night. This fantastic lighting arrangement will take some of your driveway lighting needs off the grid, reducing both impact on the environment and your electric bills.

Integrated Lighting

Now used in many streets and highways across the world, integrated lighting is a great way to make your driveway a safer place to drive without disturbing your surrounding landscape. With this strategy, small light fixtures are installed within the driveway surface, protecting the light fixtures from snow plows. Integrated lighting will eliminate these challenges in different seasons.

When combined with a driveway heating system, your driveway will always be snow- and ice-free, and well-lit for safety.

Using Trees

Lighting your driveway from above - from a single tree or multiple trees that line the driveway - can give the illusion of moonlight filtering through the canopy.

Embedded Lighting

If your driveway features a retaining wall or masonry garden wall along its length (or even at the parking area) this is a great opportunity to install landscape lights right into the masonry itself, for a luxe and a clutter-free look.