Responsible Landscape Lighting Design

Williams Landscape Lighting Design strives to provide our clients subtle and beautiful landscape lighting, with an absolute minimum of glare, light trespass and light pollution. We aim to use energy prudently by utilizing appropriate lighting controls and efficient lighting sources. We also inform our clients about the science and psychology of vision, the current state of research in how lighting impacts wildlife and the importance of preserving the night sky.

We believe that happy neighbors improve our clients’ enjoyment of their landscape lighting. We believe it is necessary to shield glare from the view of the client, the neighbor and any passersby. We understand that irresponsible lighting has the potential to negatively impact the quality of life for the larger community.

Simply stated, we aim to responsibly create a sense of security, safety, beauty, pride of ownership, and magic in nighttime landscapes. Below is a summary of the guidelines and practices we employ to achieve our goals:

We talk with and listen to our clients:

As Landscape Lighting Designers, we have a unique opportunity to educate our clients about the issues of glare, light trespass, and preservation of the night sky.
We pay particular attention to our clients’ desire for safety and balance their wishes with information about the science of vision, glare, and our desire to preserve the night skies and light-sensitive wildlife habitat for the future.
We share with our clients the fact that no reliable research has proved that any reasonable amount of additional light will guarantee their personal security.
We will share the fact that luminaires properly placed and focused to create glare-free illumination of common hazards such as outdoor steps and other unseen hazards, will provide significant increases in our clients’ safety.

We select the right fixture:

The light source must be hidden from view. We use luminaires with modern glare control features such as regressed lamps, external shrouds and internal louvers. If the fixture’s light source may be seen from normal viewing positions, that fixture will create glare.
When all else is equal, we believe that the most compact luminaire with the smallest light source is usually the best choice.
We urge our clients to minimize the use of poorly shielded decorative lights. Outdoor post-top and wall-mounted luminaires should direct light downward, not outward or upward. Fixtures with decorative lamps and poor shielding should be avoided because bare, bright lamps degrade the viewer’s night vision adaptation level and introduce glare.
If decorative fixtures are needed for aesthetic effect, we suggest installing the low wattage incandescent lamps and dim them to a pleasing warm glow.
The use of unshielded post-top or wall-mounted fixtures for pathway or step lighting may cause disabling glare for the elderly and create a significant hazard that should be avoided for all age groups.
The control of glare from unshielded fixtures allows the effective use of lower wattage lamps in the landscape lighting design. Glare, and the disturbance it causes night vision, will make it impossible for the client to see the beauty that low wattage lighting can bring to their landscape.

We select the right lamp for the right fixture:

Today our rich assortment of lamp families is in transition. Each lamp family has its plusses and minuses. Second only to the selection of the proper lighting fixture, the selection of the proper lamp is critical to the long-term success of the landscape lighting design. Important considerations follow:

Initial Cost - The cost of the light fixture and lamp installed.
Expected Life - Initial costs may be balanced by increased life and dependably.
Lifetime Cost - The fact that energy costs may easily exceed all other costs should be considered.
Serviceability - Is the product serviceable? If not, is lack of serviceability acceptable to the client?
Color Temperature - (Relative Warmth or Coolness of Light) Is often a matter of taste, so it’s important our clients see a mock-up.
Flicker - Should be avoided as it’s a potential health hazard for some. In others, flicker may cause annoyance and/or headaches.

The beam spread, or “distribution” of the lamp/luminaire combination should be no larger than what is needed to illuminate the target. We are careful to select a lamp that offers the right distribution to light the object or plant material selected with minimal spill.

If we light a tree and find the topmost canopy brightly illuminated, we know that excessive light is escaping into the night sky. We may relamp to a lower intensity or dim so a greater portion of the light remains captured within the canopy.
When lighting signs or residential addresses, we use a lamp with a distribution no larger than the sign. The light should “stop” at the sign, rather than spill beyond. Lenses that shape the beam can be very useful in such applications.
Our clients’ increased interest in energy savings, increased lamp life and the potential for reduced environmental impacts offered by the Light Emitting Diode (LED) is fueling our continued exploration of the LED’s potentials.
We monitor the LED manufacturers’ refinements of capabilities for the retrofit LEDs in lumen output, distribution and critical heat management.
We also monitor the ever expanding choices of Landscape Lighting luminaires that are designed to make maximum use of LED technology

We select the best fixture placement and aim carefully:

We control light trespass by placing fixtures in positions that allow us to aim them into objects or plant materials that will trap excess light. The illumination of objects and plants from a variety of positions often produces the most beautiful nighttime compositions.
All use of uplight should be judicious and sited with care
Any use of sidelight must be carefully considered, because sidelight markedly increases the probability of light trespass and glare. In each case, we consider the neighbors and passersby and how they experience our design.
Whenever possible, we light signs from above. Residential addresses should be illuminated at levels sufficient to make it easy for emergency crews and guests to find the correct address.
When we attach lighting equipment or wire to a living surface, we make every effort to protect the living surface from hurtful contact with our equipment or materials. We choose to do as little harm as possible by employing installation techniques that maintain a reasonable separation between the living surface and lighting equipment that will allow for future growth.
Regular inspection and appropriate relaxing of contact areas are essential for the continued health of the living surface and maintenance of the lighting equipment.
Accurate daylight focusing of landscape lighting is impossible and a disservice to the client. Only at night is possible to correctly aim a luminaire.

We encourage wildlife and energy conservation:

We are mindful that a number of endangered species are harmed through an inappropriate introduction of artificial lighting, particularly during sensitive times of the year. We support local, state and national efforts to curb such abuses.
We avoid lighting the entire landscape. An artistic composition that includes brighter, dimmer and even dark areas is far more pleasing to the eye than one in which every feature is floodlighted into lighted uniformly.
We urge our clients to turn the lights off when they are not needed. There is no need to light the landscape when no one is there to appreciate it! We suggest they use automatic controls employing such devices as occupancy sensors, astronomical time clocks, or photocell and timer combinations that switch off the lights after a user-selectable time period.
The use of energy efficient LED light sources will offer the client considerable energy savings over time.
When we eliminate unshielded fixtures that produce glare in the landscape, we free ourselves to use more efficient lamps effectively.

We encourage regular maintenance:

In addition to protecting our client’s investment, regular maintenance ensures that the correct focus and lamping of the design is preserved.
Some of the most egregious sins of residential landscape design are the result of fixtures that have been accidentally relocated by lawn mowers.