Poolside Lights: Choosing the Right Lighting

A pool is an excellent place to spend hot summer days and enjoy some fun with the entire family. Why keep the entertaining to daylight hours? Adding poolside lights can extend the time you spend together outdoors and allow for nighttime socializing. Poolside lights look beautiful and increase the safety around the water, allowing guests to avoid an accidental swim. Read on to gather some excellent pool light ideas to improve your outdoor living experience.

The area surrounding your pool is an excellent place to begin lighting. Do you have an outdoor patio? Any walkways? Are there any water features such as a fountain that would look excellent lit up at night? Is the house providing any supplemental light? Interesting features like trees can provide a great focal point for your lights. If you have a firepit, be sure to consider the light that the flames provide in designing your space. Besides just aesthetics, lighting in the area directly around your pool ensures that everyone can see where they are going and prevent any falls, especially around stairs. Walkway lights are not to be overlooked. Soft lights can lend a cozy feel to the space while brighter lights make the area more functional.

There is a large variety of lighting styles available, limited only by your specific taste. Hanging string lights above and around your pool, including around trees and pergolas, can lend a romantic, fairytale feel to your space. Torches, especially those with real flames, can also add character to your landscape. Floodlights, on the other hand, are typically more practical than stylish. Floodlights shine down from a high position, illuminating everything in their path, but the light tends to be harsh and bright. Spotlights highlight one specific area of importance and can improve the look of your landscape in the dark. Well lights are embedded into the ground, and are used to light paths, but can also be used as a specific type of spotlight. Hardscape lights are perfect for embedding into concrete, steps, walking paths and walls in order to light the way. Often subtle, they provide enough light for people to see exactly where they are going.

Though not necessarily required, lighting inside your pool is an excellent idea to consider. If you or your family want to go for an evening swim, it is very helpful to be able to see where you are going in the water. Pool lights also create an inviting and visually appealing environment so everyone will want to dive right in. LED lights are often the light of choice because they last so long. Many are designed to be waterproof and some even offer color-changing capabilities. 

Tips for Choosing Pool Lighting

• Add adequate lighting all around the pool, to keep guests safe.
• Aim for Efficiency, use light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs.
• Consider which features you want to highlight, place lights in water features and landscape elements.
• Automate your system, automate everything from pool lights to water features all in one.

When it comes to swimming pool lights, there are several great options out there to choose from. Choose from multicolored light show to classic white lights. Everything in your landscape should be carefully planned out and the lighting should compliment any landscape features you have.

With so many landscape lighting options we are sure that you will find the right style and lighting feature for your pool and landscape design. If you have questions or to see our full selection of landscape lighting at DripWorks, visit our website at dripworks.com or call us at 800-522-3747.