Browse Forums Landscape & Garden Design 1 May 06, 2011 6:47 am Just a quick one, which I think only I can answer anyway, but still. We met up with a landscape designer last week and in the initial plans he's got drawn up for us it includes lighting out front to light up the trees along the path we'll be doing. Is this too....pretentious? I kinda like the idea, but at the same time I feel like I'm getting a bit ahead of myself if you know what I mean. Also, in the back we were talking about putting a water feature out there, and now we're not sure. What other options could we use for a feature? Thanks Land Deposit - 18/12/2009 Became a land Baron - 21/12/2010 Site Start - 27/1/2011 All moved in!! Garden Lighting 2May 06, 2011 8:53 am That is a tough call isn't it. Over all it will be an excellent feature to have a few trees lit up at night. However if your suburb is inclined to have a few rusty Falcons or Sigmas on bricks out the front, then yes it is going to be a bit pretentious. As for an alternative water feature... many would know what my answer is to that. A frog pond. Do a fancy one. Have a nice feature wall behind and the pond below. I'm a very practical person and to me water features that dribble water down a wall don't achieve much. I mean they sound great on principal but the day to day working means there's not much water sound, algae and minerals build up on the wall and I guess they are on really used when people come over for a BBQ. Also the evap rates of many water features doesn't really make them a sustainable option. They look good though. By incorporating a frog pond with out having water cascading down the wall it is sustainable, is easier care, lower associated costs and give kids something to do for hours. Great to see lighting being used more. There was a good TED talk on lighting in architecture that would be worth a watch on their website. 15mins or so. Lots of ideas and inspirations not to mention no better guide than for how to do it well than from that chap. Re: Garden Lighting 3May 06, 2011 10:14 am Hehe while we're far from an affluent suburb in Beveridge, I don't think we're quite at dead cars yet To be honest one of my concerns is vandalism. I'll find out off the guy (Whose link I got through H1 for the record. Yay for a working site!) what exactly he's got in mind though, because it was just mentioned as feature lighting. If it's really big/pronounced I'd be cautious about it as we're in the 3rd stage so we're still subject to random window smashings and the like as there's not a lot of people around at present. The frog pond idea has got me intrigued though. My grandparents used to have a turtle in a pond and it fascinated me growing up. What would the logistics of that be? Like how would you go about it and so on. I do agree with you in relation to most of your points about the water feature though. TED? Land Deposit - 18/12/2009 Became a land Baron - 21/12/2010 Site Start - 27/1/2011 All moved in!! Garden Lighting 4May 06, 2011 10:45 am TED is a gathering world wide of the greatest thinkers and doers that are the very people that if given the chance, turn our world around for the better on a road to repair tomorrow or even today, right now. They are linked throughout the world and each get 15mins to share their knowledge online with the world. I'll find a link for you to the lighting one. I'd be inclined to suggest feature lighting for the back. Far more practical and let's face it, you wont be hanging out in the front yard. The effect of well chosen garden lighting will add ambience and be practical. Frog ponds, Yes I do have to get onto doing this. A heap of folks interested. There are some easy things to do that make them work. I have posted links here and there on frog ponds but We need a dedicated thread Re: Garden Lighting 5May 06, 2011 10:59 am Why Light needs Darkness (17mins) http://www.ted.com/talks/rogier_van_der ... kness.html TED Talks http://www.ted.com/talks Re: Garden Lighting 6May 06, 2011 11:14 am As for your frog pond, I was thinking your normal wall with a low semicircle or square base that is made of stone or rendered brick with capping tiles what ever. Not have water running down though. Just a nice vertical feature. But inside the pond to do it so at best with folks over you can flick a pump on just to create bubbling water. Bubbling water will not make you want to go and have a wee all time. It sounds more natural like a creek does. Just have a pump, no fancy attachments that decorate the water in pretty ways, just the outlet below the water. Use a mixture of zeolite and crushed granite as a base. That is what will sustain the ponds health. Pretty pebbles don't cut it. Have the whole thing like a beach. Deep end going to a shallow end. Plant Juncus or Ficinea around the shallow parts or even right though it and lots of Nardoo or other native aquatic plants. Just pack it in with plants. Try use native fish in there. They generally don't eat frog eggs or taddies. Native fish don't eat the plants really either. You won't have to feed them. They'll take care of them selves. You will have no mozzies either, they'll eat 'em. The grasses in shallow water will be where many frogs lay the their eggs. Dense foliage in the pond means algae of the not cool types won't flourish. Algae that does form will be a wonderful food source for the fish and taddies which will clean the pond of algae once a year for the cycle to recommence Many native aquatic plants will also grow roots into some algaes and live in harmony with them. The water will stay crystal clear too. It just will without you having to stuff about with chemicals to correct nonsense this or nonsense that. The base of crushed granite and zeolite allows two essential bacteria to establish in the there. They are what is needed to convert the ammonia from the fish into available forms of nitrogen for the plants to use. With out that, the whole lot flares up with dirty stinky mess and goes yucky green and you go, "What have we done, this sucks" So get the mix in there, wash all the soil from the plant roots before planting and plant them into the gravel. By doing it that way, you get the modern trendy hardscaped look but when you look in it is all different, sustainable meets commercial style Re: Garden Lighting 7May 06, 2011 11:40 am One thing is if your not sure, get the landscaper to lay a conduit under driveway/paths so that if you do decide to add lighting later, it will make the wireing job so much easier! Some people don't have time to do the job right the first time, but seem to have plenty of time to fix their mistakes. Build Thread Re: Garden Lighting 8May 06, 2011 12:16 pm Bloody good point Even if it isn't used you might want to add something later and Richo's idea nails it Re: Garden Lighting 9May 06, 2011 9:38 pm If you want ideas or inspiration on how to properly design lighting into gardens have look at the case studies by Melbourne company Light on Landscape. They provide advice and consultation to the Top Landscape Designers in Melbourne. Cheers Luke “A doctor can bury his mistakes but an architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.” Frank Lloyd Wright Re: Garden Lighting 12May 10, 2011 9:09 pm We are having garden lighting too mainly for the larger trees and a path light. Thanks for reminding me to ensure I suss out the ditch witch when the bloke comes. Hmmm frogs in the garden will eat the unwanted bugs I guess won't they. What else do they provide for the garden. Any -ve points? We've had a few frogs hang around the yard which has been nice to see. A rarity where we were previously living. Re: Garden Lighting 13May 10, 2011 11:32 pm Not really, some can be noisy during breeding times. I think the motorbike frog has to the cake for noise. Whooping frogs are pretty loud sometimes too. I guess they have similar cousins over east. Most are pretty quiet though. Re: Garden Lighting 14May 11, 2011 4:20 pm The crazy frog definitely takes the cake, especially as a ringtone. Also, if you're in the rusty sigma part of town, is it or is it not a little pretentious to use garden lighting to illuminate the rusting shells in your 3 foot high front lawn? I'm getting some ideas here.... Homestead Homes SA: The Lamont Bayswood Estate; Aldinga Beach Preliminary Signing: April 2010 Floorplans: 13 June 2010 Building Contract: 19 June 2010 Selections: 28 Sept 2010 Scraped; Trenching: 21 Jan 2011 Slab Poured: 28 Jan 2011 Framing: 17 Feb 2011 | Completed 24 Feb 2011 Roof & Gutters: 02 Mar 2011 Bricks: 03 Mar 2011 Wire-up: 12 Mar 2011 Re: Garden Lighting 15May 11, 2011 4:29 pm Our friends had a frog pond next door and they kept getting motorbike frogs. They were kept up all night every night for a few weeks. I think they were ready to set fire and drive one of those old sigmas or falcons into the frog pond towards the end. haha. I personally like garden lighting. Maybe wait til its a bit more built up if theft and damage is an issue. Garden Lighting 16May 12, 2011 10:36 pm Yep, Lukes right, those friggin' motorbike frogs will make you do all the above. Crazy frog is an amateur. It is only a few weeks though and they get the ladies attention and it's over. It can be worse if there is noise say from a barbie, or a loud tv or noisy neighbors. They try to compete with the noise. What I find fascinating is how they seem to respond to human noise but not insect or bird noise. Interesting. I'll post a link to what they sound like. Personally the noise the motorbike frogs bother me little if at all. They are a bit of a bully in the frog world. They are cannibalistic and take out other frog species. Your normal urban block size would mean minimal disturbance if any. Cottage blocks would annoy some and not others for that short lervin' time. Re: Garden Lighting 17May 12, 2011 11:05 pm http://frogs.org.au/frogwatch/ http://frogwatch.museum.wa.gov.au/ http://frogwatch.museum.wa.gov.au/South ... fault.aspx (click the audio link for the MotorBike Frog.) Yes they really do sound like a flogged out postie bike going past. You'd think twice about what you heard. Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ I'd love to be able to photo shop a motorbike frog as the rider, into that pic Re: Garden Lighting 18May 18, 2011 6:41 am Looking like at this stage we're going to go without the lighting out the front, but I think I might get the builder to whack in an external power point incase we change our mind. Still weighing up our options for the back yard/water feature area. I actually wouldn't mind having a giant tree with a little relaxing area set up around it. Something that will put out a lot of shade (For the dogs) and I wouldn't mind if it had some thicker branches on it that could withstand children tugging on it down the line Bah my house isn't even finished yet and I'm more keen to get the garden started than moving in I think Land Deposit - 18/12/2009 Became a land Baron - 21/12/2010 Site Start - 27/1/2011 All moved in!! Re: Garden Lighting 19May 18, 2011 8:44 am Twiggy Just a quick one, which I think only I can answer anyway, but still. We met up with a landscape designer last week and in the initial plans he's got drawn up for us it includes lighting out front to light up the trees along the path we'll be doing. Is this too....pretentious? I kinda like the idea, but at the same time I feel like I'm getting a bit ahead of myself if you know what I mean. Also, wouldn't the plain removable solar light planks works fairly well too (no need for wires)?? Can't help on anything with water - not a fan of water fetaures My signature is distracting people from my wise posts ... Building Standards; Getting It Right! 1. optional, you can but normally just use the earth from the main switch board 2. should be enough but the distance determines voltage drop - sparky should work it… 1 28820 I have a really long hallway which is 1100mm W x 11500mm L I would appreciate if anyone can give suggestions to light it up with Linear LED lights that goes from wall to… 0 8823 What? 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