This was the primary motivation for creating The Hansen Light. See the History page for more information, but in short, all other landscape lights, regardless how expensive, simply aren't designed to last a long time. The Hansen Light is designed to have durability equivalent to the rest of your home: walls, driveway, windows, doors, or a top-quality roof. All other landscape lights will start to look lousy within a year or two without a lot of maintenance, and most will require far more light-bulb changes. And there's more. Much more...

Why masonry? Because landscape lights are subjected to a harsh environment: direct sunlight all day; rain; sprinklers (shooting water upwards at them); dirt; organisms; rodents and insects; gardening tool strikes; accidental bumps; etc.; and masonry holds up far better than any metal, plastic, or fiberglass, no matter how well coated or treated. And on top of that, it just looks nice.

The Hansen Light is currently available with a brick or stone column, and a top cap of brick or high-strength mortar. Other materials may be possible, but would need to be evaluated for suitability.

By the use of tiny light bulbs, tucked up underneath an adjustable glare shield, The Hansen Light can be set to illuminate the surrounding area (approximately 3' radius of useful light -- it fades out from there) with virtually no glare. "No glare" is very important, not only for enjoyable lighting, but also for the usefulness of the light. Here's why: When we look at a bright light, our pupils constrict. This makes it easier to look at the bright light, but makes everything else darker. And that defeats the purpose of the light. In contrast, if there is no glare, then it doesn't take much light intensity to adequately illuminate the path, and the effect is much more pleasing.

In addition to illuminating the area surrounding the light, Hansen Lights also illuminate themselves with pleasing color and intensity. This displays the nice masonry work, and serves as an illuminated marker along a path, further assisting people walking down a path.

The Hansen Light is designed so that plants and flowers may grow right up next to column, where they too are illuminated. Approximately 6" of soil depth is available, right next to the column.

The Hansen Light is designed to endure a lot of abuse, and to be repairable & replaceable, including individual components (there are four primary components).

The Hansen Light uses a custom-made light unit, utilizing 8, type 2181 light bulbs (typically used for instrument panels and electronics indicator lights). Each bulb has a rated lifespan of approximately 30,000 hours (normally rated at 20,000 hours, but due to operating at lower voltage, the lifespan is extended considerably). The lifespan of the entire unit will be somewhat less, because there are four sets of two bulbs in series. But even if it lasts just 10,000 hours, that's approximately 5-1/2 years of operation at five hours per night, without having to change a light bulb. And when it does burn out, three options are available: Replace it with a new light unit (available from Hansen Light, and can be installed in about 5-10 minutes); have Hansen Light rebuild the burned-out unit (1/2 price of a new unit); or a handyman-type person can buy the light bulbs through an electronics stores, solder them into place, seal it back up with exterior-grade silicone sealant, and then it's good for another 5-10 years @ 5 hrs/night.

The light units themselves operate on 12vac, but each unit also comes with a little transformer so that it may be directly connected to 120vac. 120v is preferable, because it virtually eliminates voltage drop (which tends to make low voltage lights dim, particularly those that are a long distance from the transformer), and also gives better control over the voltage that is actually delivered to the lights (thereby better controlling the brightness of each light, and protecting against over-voltage, which can greatly reduce bulb life).

Speaking as an electrician who's installed and repaired many landscape lights, underground electrical connections that have gone bad is a common problem. Water and dirt gets into those connections and eventually causes them to fail. The Hansen Light has a 3" conduit running up through the center, where conduits and/or cables can be brought in, and then the connections made in a dry, above-ground location. What's more, since the Hansen Light is a junction box, there is no need for any other junction boxes in the yard.

All metal parts are stainless steel. The gasket is 1/4" thick, high-resilience silicone rubber, which also serves as a shock-absorber for impacts to the top cap. All nuts, screws, and washers are a hefty 1/4-20, commonly available at any hardware store.

At the location of each Hansen Light, just dig a hole, 16x16x16, fill the bottom of the hole with a sand-clay soil mix (commonly available at Lowes or Home Depot, next to the stepping stones) level the sand-clay mix, tamp it down (a 16x6x8 cinder block works well) set the Hansen Light on it (bringing your conduits up through the center) and then backfill with dirt. Then just connect the light unit, attach the top support plate and top cap, and it's complete. For full instructions, click here.

Each Hansen Light uses just 12 watts of electricity (!) using a highly efficient, custom-designed light unit, built only by Hansen Light (but it's simple enough that it can be repaired by the handyman).

Here's what I mean by "custom craftsmanship": A small group of people building unique products for each customer ("custom") and it takes skill and care to build each one ("craftsmanship").