The best lights for uplighting trees are chosen tree by tree. A tall trunk with a high crown takes a narrow spot, a low spreading tree takes a wider flood, and a dense evergreen gets washed from farther out. In a mulched bed, use an above-grade spotlight. In mowed lawn, use a flush in-grade well light.
Brightness is the wrong place to start. The housing and the beam spread matter more, and the ground and the tree decide both. How much output a tree needs is a separate question, answered on our garden and tree uplighting page.
Should it be a spotlight or a well light?
Look at what’s under the tree first. A spotlight on a stake stands above grade, so in a mulched bed or border it sits among the plants and can be re-aimed by hand. Put the same fixture in open lawn and it’s in the way of every mower and string trimmer.
For a tree in turf that gets mowed right up to the trunk, a well light set flush with the grass is the right call. The mower rolls over it and nothing sticks up.
Neither is maintenance-free. A well light faces the sky from a hole in damp ground, so rain, clippings and leaves land on its lens, and it can’t tilt as far as a spotlight on its knuckle. Spotlight lenses silt up under mulch, and freeze-thaw can shift a stake off its aim in one winter. Both spend the year in wet soil, which is why we spec solid brass and copper over painted aluminum. Middle Tennessee humidity and freeze-thaw cycles punish any coating.
Which beam suits which tree?
A tall tree with one trunk and a crown held high, such as a mature oak or a tulip poplar, needs a narrow beam that climbs the trunk and still reaches the branches without spilling into the beds. A tree that grows low and wide needs a wider flood.
Aim a narrow spot into a broad crown and you get one bright stripe with dark canopy on both sides.
Bark matters too. Deep-furrowed oak bark catches a beam and shows every ridge, while a young poplar’s smooth bark lets it slide past. Crepe myrtles are their own case. They grow as several smooth, peeling trunks, and in winter those trunks are most of what there is to see, so the light is aimed to run up the stems. Our step-by-step method for designing landscape lighting puts this choice at step four, after the focal points are picked.
Evergreens and dense canopies
A Southern magnolia is easy to light badly. It keeps a dense crown all year and is often left branched to the ground, so there may be no visible trunk to climb and no winter thinning to let light through. A fixture tucked under the branches lights the undersides of the lowest leaves, which on many magnolias are a dull rusty brown. Set the fixtures out past the edge of the branches instead, from two sides if the tree is seen from both, and wash the outer face of the crown with a wider beam.
Hollies and other dense evergreens are lit the same way. A screen of evergreens along a property line is lit as one mass, because picking out a single trunk in a row of a dozen looks like a mistake. Our page on landscape lighting in Brentwood works through the same judgment on mature white oaks and sugar maples.
How many fixtures does one tree need?
A mature oak or maple typically takes two fixtures at different angles, and a young specimen tree takes one. The count rises with the number of directions the tree is seen from. A tree against the back fence, viewed mainly from the driveway, can get by with its best side lit.
One standing alone in open lawn, in view from the street, the porch and the kitchen window, is lit from two or three sides so the canopy has depth wherever you stand.
Deciding which trees get lit comes first, and landscape lighting ideas for Middle Tennessee homes covers that. The count is settled on a landscape lighting design walk, which we prefer to do at dusk so the trees are seen in real light.
When should the light come from above?
Moonlighting turns the fixture around. It’s mounted high in the branches and aimed down, and the leaves break the beam into dappled shade on the lawn or patio below. It needs a tree tall enough, with open enough branches, to hold a fixture well up in the crown, which rules out most ornamentals and young trees.
On a big oak it’s a second layer over the uplights. The uplights show the tree, and the downlight shows the ground under it.
Mounting is where the tree’s health comes in. Anything attached to a trunk or limb, a strap or the cable running up to the fixture, has to leave room for growth. A band that stays the same size while the wood thickens can girdle the tree.
Re-aiming as the tree grows
An uplight set for a tree that has since put on four feet of height no longer lands where it was drawn. Limbs thicken, the crown spreads, and a beam aimed through a gap in the leaves gets blocked by growth that wasn’t there on install day. On the final walkthrough, Phil tests every circuit and adjusts anything that isn’t exactly right, but that aim fits the tree as it stands that day.
So when you compare fixtures, ask whether the beam spread is fixed or can be changed with a different lamp or lens. A tree that fills out will outgrow the narrow spot that suited it the first year. Low-voltage cable runs shallow, so a fixture can be lifted and moved without a trench. Someone still has to go and look. Re-aiming and repositioning fixtures is part of our outdoor lighting maintenance and repair service.
Common questions
Should I use a well light or a spotlight to uplight a tree?
Let the ground under the tree decide. In lawn that gets mowed up to the trunk, use a well light set flush with the turf so the mower passes over it. In a mulched bed or border, a stake-mounted spotlight fits better, and it can be re-aimed by hand as the tree grows.
A well light collects water and clippings on its lens, so expect to clean it more often.
How many uplights does a large oak need?
Usually two, at different angles around the trunk, so the crown has depth. An oak seen from one direction, say against a back fence, can get by with one fixture on its best side. A large oak alone in open lawn, in view from the street and the house, is lit from two or three sides.
The final count is best set after dark, with the tree in front of you.
How do you light a magnolia or other dense evergreen?
From outside the tree, not underneath it. A Southern magnolia holds a dense crown all year and is often branched to the ground, so a fixture tucked under it lights little but the undersides of the lower leaves. Set the fixtures out past the edge of the branches and wash the outer face of the crown with a wider beam.
Can lights be mounted in a tree without harming it?
Yes, if the mounting leaves the tree room to grow. The danger is anything that stays the same size while a trunk or limb thickens, such as a tight strap or cable, because over time it can girdle the tree.
The fixture also needs a limb high and strong enough to carry it, so moonlighting suits mature trees with open branches.
