Landscape Lighting to Show Off Your Exterior
A Westlake client once told me her house “disappeared” at night. She had spent real money on a limestone facade and mature live oaks, and by eight o’clock all of it went black except for two glaring porch bulbs. My name is Trey Holloway, and I’ve spent the last 18 years designing and installing outdoor lighting around Austin and the Hill Country. That call stuck with me because it’s exactly the job landscape lighting does that nothing else can: it decides what your house looks like for the twelve dark hours a day. On a lot like hers, with big oaks and pale stone, getting the nighttime elevation right is a bigger transformation than most people expect.
Lighting in layers, not lumens
The mistake I see most is treating outdoor lighting like flipping on the sun. More lumens is not the goal; contrast is. I build a scene in layers. Uplights graze the trunks of live oaks and wash the limestone so you actually read the texture, instead of just seeing a lit wall. A soft moonlighting fixture set high in a canopy throws dappled shadow across the driveway the way real moonlight would. Path lights, kept low and spaced generously, guide feet without turning the walkway into a runway. When those layers work together, the eye moves the way I want it to and the house has depth after dark instead of just glare.
On Westlake’s honey-colored limestone I lean toward warm color temperature, 2700K to 3000K. Cooler light makes stone look gray and clinical. Warm light makes it glow the way it does at sunset, which is when everyone wants to be out on the patio anyway.
The four terms that show up on every estimate
Before you get quotes for tuckpointing your budget for lighting, it helps to know what each line item is actually buying you. Here’s how I break it down for clients:
| Technique | How it’s done | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Uplighting | Fixture at the base of a tree or wall, aimed up | Texture and drama on trunks and masonry |
| Downlighting (moonlighting) | Mounted high in a tree or eave, aimed down | Gentle, safe light over stairs and patios |
| Grazing | Fixture set inches from a stone or brick wall | Exaggerates joints and shadow lines on masonry |
| Silhouetting | Backlights a plant against a lit wall | Turns an agave or yucca into a dark shape |
For a typical curb-appeal job I combine facade grazing, two or three tree uplights, and a modest run of path lighting. That’s enough to make a house look intentional without lighting it up like a car dealership.
Low-voltage LED, and why I stopped installing anything else
I install almost nothing but low-voltage LED now. A transformer steps household current down to twelve volts, which is safer to work around planting beds and lets me run buried cable without conduit. LED fixtures draw a fraction of what the old halogens did, last 40,000 hours or more, and run cool enough that they won’t scorch mulch sitting up against them. The Department of Energy’s primer on LED lighting efficiency lays out why the switch pays for itself in energy alone, and it matches what I see job to job.
I put every system on an astronomical timer or a photocell so it follows the seasons without the homeowner touching it, and I’ll add a smart controller if someone wants to dim scenes from their phone. In our summers, when nobody comes outside until the heat breaks around nine, being able to warm the lights up gradually as dusk actually happens is a genuinely nice touch, not a gimmick.
What it actually costs in the Austin area
| Job size | Typical scope | Price range |
|---|---|---|
| Modest system | Transformer, 6–10 quality fixtures, professional install | $2,500–$5,000 |
| Larger property | Tree lighting, multiple zones | $6,000–$12,000 |
The single biggest driver of quality is fixture material: spend on cast brass or copper, not stamped aluminum. Our sun and sprinkler water destroy cheap housings in a couple of years, and I’ve replaced enough builder-grade aluminum fixtures to say that with confidence. The sand and lime that go into a lot of cheaper installs are inexpensive too, but that’s not where the real cost or the real value in this work lives.
If your budget is tight, lighting is still one of the highest-impact projects on a short list of affordable exterior wins. I often pair it with a couple of other quick upgrades from low-maintenance curb appeal projects under $2,000 so a client gets a full nighttime transformation in one visit rather than piecemeal over years.
Questions I get on every walk-through
How much does landscape lighting cost to install? A professional low-voltage LED system with six to ten fixtures runs about $2,500 to $5,000 in the Austin area. Larger properties with tree lighting and multiple zones reach $6,000 to $12,000. Fixture material matters most: cast brass or copper outlasts cheap stamped aluminum by years, especially with our sun and sprinklers working against it.
What color temperature is best for outdoor lighting on stone or brick homes? Warm white, 2700K to 3000K, for most homes. It flatters limestone, brick, and wood, while cooler light makes natural materials look gray and washed out. I reserve cooler tones for specific modern or security applications, not for facades.
Is landscape lighting expensive to run every night? No. Low-voltage LED fixtures draw very little power, often under 5 watts each, so a full system costs only a few dollars a month. A timer or photocell keeps it from running longer than it needs to.
Should I repair an old lighting system or replace it? If the transformer and wiring are sound but fixtures are corroded aluminum, I’ll usually swap fixtures for brass or copper and reuse the low-voltage wiring. If the transformer is undersized or the layout was never designed in layers to begin with, a full re-do costs more up front but saves you from paying twice.