Deck Lighting in Mount Washington, OH

There is one position on a Mount Washington (ZIP 45230) deck where a light fitting should never go, and it is the position a catalog picture will put it in. On these ranches and split-levels the deck is set a step down so the guard clears the wide rear window, which leaves the rail cap at almost exactly the height of the glass.

A post cap or a fitting on top of that run is then sitting in the window from the inside. It is at eye height for anybody on the sofa, it is a bright point with nothing around it, and most of what it produces lands on the glass. The room is doing the same thing back out: a lit living room throws its own light through that window onto the first few feet of boards, which is the part of the deck that needs it least.

So the fittings go below the line and turn inward. Under-rail strip fixed to the underside of the cap and aimed at the floor, which puts the source behind the rail from every angle in the room. Riser lights in the flight. Post caps only on the runs the window does not look along, which on most of these decks is two of the three. The window then has a lit deck in front of it and no lamps in it.

The far end is where the output goes instead. On a lot that falls away behind the house the good part of the deck is the end furthest from the glass, so that is the end that gets the corner fitting, the guard line and the head of the flight. From the room it reads as depth going away from you, which is what the big window was for.