Good garden lighting is fitted once and forgotten; the other kind is a string of failures traced back to indoor cable in outdoor weather. I install garden, patio and security lighting across Bristol, on outdoor-rated cable and fittings, buried and protected the way BS 7671 expects, so the system survives the winters your garden actually has.
Garden and patio lighting: design, ratings, cable routes
The design rule outdoors is restraint: light the destinations, the seating, the steps, the tree worth seeing, and let the darkness in between do the composition. The engineering rule is that everything must be rated for where it lives, fittings by IP rating for spray and immersion, cable either armoured or properly protected, joints in enclosures made for the job rather than tape and optimism. Steps and level changes are the one place more light is always the right answer, because that's the lighting that stops a hospital trip.
Security and PIR floodlights
A well-aimed PIR floodlight is cheap deterrence: sudden light where someone expected darkness. The craft is the aiming, covering the approach without triggering on every cat and without floodlighting your neighbour's bedroom, which is both courtesy and the practical difference between a light that stays on the wall and one you're asked to move. Modern LED units draw a fraction of the old halogens, so the running cost argument against leaving them armed is gone.
Dark garden or a blind spot by the door?
Send a photo of the area and I'll suggest a scheme — with a written price for supply, fitting and certification.
Powering it properly: circuits, not extension leads
Outdoor electrics need RCD protection and a supply designed for outside, full stop. The extension lead through the window is a summer habit that becomes a winter fault, and the "outdoor" transformer plugged in behind the sofa is its slightly smarter cousin. A proper outdoor supply, from a protected circuit through correctly glanded, weatherproof gear, costs less than most people expect and it's the difference between garden power and garden risk. Bigger loads, offices, sheds and hot tubs, step up to their own supply.
What outdoor lighting costs
These are estimates, not quotes. Final costings always follow a free site inspection — and jobs often come in under the estimate, never over without you agreeing it first.
Wired garden fittings typically £60–£110 each installed on a run, PIR security lights £75–£130 fitted, with trenching for buried runs as the main variable and priced by the metre. Indicative, confirmed from photos of the garden and where the supply will come from.
Can outdoor lights run off an indoor circuit?
They can be fed from the installation, that's normal, but the outdoor portion must be RCD-protected and built with outdoor-rated cable, fittings and connections. What they can't safely be is indoor kit that happens to be outside.
What IP rating do garden lights need?
It depends where each fitting lives: rain-exposed walls, ground level splash, or in-ground and immersed all demand different ratings, which is why my quotes specify the rating per fitting instead of promising "weatherproof".
How much does a security light cost to fit?
From £75–£130 for a quality LED PIR unit fitted to an accessible wall with power nearby; the price moves with cable route and height, and a photo of the wall gets you a firm number.
