Does anyone have any suggestions on where I should place path lights and spotlights in my front yard? Any suggestions are welcome.
Lovely home, Lmdeaton1. Please see my diagram of your photo here for one possible plan. I’m basically recommending you spotlight the largest sections of your facade and the gable indicated. I think fairly narrow beam spreads (+/- 15-20 degrees) should work to highlight the brick work at the corners along the facade. And +/- 38 degrees for the section between the two windows on the right. I like the idea of you either uplighting the Japanese maple or uplighting the two narrow sections (indicated by the orange graphics) flanking that large window but I think doing both could put too much light into that area. Others may disagree. For the yard, consider uplighting both those trees indicated. Suggested path light locations are indicated by the circles. I am on the fence about a path light where the orange circle is. I also like the idea of you highlighting one of those groups of shrubs (the group on the left would be my first choice) with a mini-floodlight or two. Again, you have a lovely house and well manicured yard. IMO, you really don’t need to go with very bright lamps to create an impressive lighting plan.
If I wanted to put a light in the flower bed on far right across the sidewalks way from house, how would you recommend running the cable? What is the best way to get across a sidewalk or driveway with wiring?
Where is your outlet? The least labor intensive way is if you have expansion joints in your walkway that are deep enough and wide enough for you to lay a wire. Or if you're lucky (unlucky?) enough to have a thick enough crack that runs the width of your walkway, you could use that. If that approach won't work, you'll probably have to drive a piece of conduit underneath your walkway and then feed your wire or wires through that. You'll likely need a flexible drill bit to bore a channel from one side of your walkway to the other. HTH
Lmdeaton1 - I went the expansion joint route in my install, but had the advantage that the wood was already 15 years old and dry rotted, making it easy to remove with a hammer and chisel. Once the cable was in place, I back filled with dry sand and topped the gap off with Sika self leveling caulk, using wood shims at each end of the joint to keep the caulk from flowing out before it had a chance to set. If that is not a convenient option for you, there is a video in the Volt University section on how to run a cable under a side walk by the drill and metal conduit method. Either method is a bunch of work but the final result is worth it. Bob
My outlet is to the right of the short Japanese maple in front. I’ll have to look at my sidewalk to see if it has expansion joints. I know my driveway does.
