How to light a pathway with smart lighting

21 April, 2022

Our outdoor spaces can often become littered with tripping hazards, from hosepipes and flowerpots to garden tools and children’s toys. And stubbing your toe on that unexpected obstacle is even easier to do once the sun’s gone down.

So, why not try these handy tips to light up your outdoor pathways? They’ll help make it easier to see where you’re going, control your lights, and beautify your outdoor space — no matter how many things you've got lying around out there!

If the path to your door or through your yard is lined with plants or trees, you can create a soft, diffused glow by placing spotlights at different angles. Why not tuck a few Lily spot lights around the base of a bush or tree? Point them upwards to illuminate the foliage and cast subtle, leaf-shaped shadows. You'll get the best of both worlds — ambient and pathway lighting!

Bright idea: Instead of using white light, add an extra wow factor by using Philips Hue Lily spot lights along the walkway. With 16 million colors, you can set just the right tone — bright neon during a party or a warm glow for a romantic dinner — all while still illuminating the path.

When you have your hands full carrying food out to the barbecue or bundles of towels to the pool, you can make switching on your backyard lighting effortless with a motion sensor. Your walkway lights will be triggered by movement as you step outside. Place an outdoor motion sensor within range of the most-frequented spots in your yard — outside the back door, on your patio, or next to the pool, for example.  

The Philips Hue Outdoor sensor allows you to set your smart lights’ intensity and color for different times of day. Have your sensor turn on dimmed lights during the early evening and brighter tones once the sun has gone down. You can even set the outdoor sensor to trigger indoor lights for when you make your way back into the house.

Bollard lights make a great choice for pathway lighting. They’re compact, slender, and easy to place along any path or among plants and shrubs. The Calla bollard path light is a modern and stylish smart light solution that’s ideal for illuminating pathways around your front or backyard. The Calla bollard is a low-voltage pathway light that is part of the Hue Low-volt range. Low-volt lights simply plug into any standard wall socket and use a transformer to reduce the voltage. It’s fun to experiment with how far apart your pathway lights should be spaced. There are no rules when it comes to creativity, but the optimal distance to get an even spread of smart light is between 1.5 and 2 meters.

Snake them along the length of your path or wrap them around the patio seating area. Bend them around your flowerbeds or shape them to your outdoor steps. Lightstrips are flexible in more ways than one! Whichever way you use outdoor strip lighting, the effect is striking. With an Outdoor lightstrip, you can create a uniform, diffused glow along your path that creates a unique outdoor lighting experience — especially when you set them to your favorite colorful light scenes.

You've spent all this time setting up beautiful outdoor pathway lighting only to forget one thing — the destination! No one wants to walk a path that leads into darkness, so make sure that each path's end point is illuminated, as well as the path itself. Illuminate your fences, hedges, or even your shed with the Amarant linear spotlight. It'll create a wall of colorful smart light that perfectly complements your pathway lighting — because your destination should be as beautiful as the journey you took.