Lake In The Hills is a great place to live, particularly now that winter is over and summer is about to spring. It’s a great place to enjoy the outdoors and to relax.

With the warm weather, outdoor fun and relaxing in a LITH summer most likely includes making the most of your back yard. Hopefully, you have a nice patio out back. If not, at least you can open some lawn chairs and throw some dogs on the grill. But, it’s just not the same, is it?

A patio makes the backyard an extension of your home; it’s that other room outside. And, when it comes to patios, brick paver patios are the royalty of their class. Nothing says distinction and elegance the way a brick paver patio can. At the same time, a brick paver patio can also turn your Lake In The Hills backyard into a backwoods paradise.

How can both be true – brick paver elegance or brick paver casual? It’s all a matter of design.

A qualified landscape design specialist knows how to use brick pavers to create the atmosphere you’re looking for. Of course, there are more factors to consider than just ambience. Your landscape design specialist will want to know how you plan to use your yard and brick paver patio. Planning to throw large parties? Size, features and traffic flow will have to fit the occasion.

Then again, if you’re looking for a more intimate setting, a landscape design specialist will place seating areas and other features so that a small group is drawn together around a central location.

What features you choose play a major role in the outcome of your brick paver patio. Gathering around a fire pit is a wonderful way to enhance a pleasant evening with a few good friends. Cooking for a large group? Your landscape design specialist can virtually create an outdoor kitchen with oven, grill and serving areas.

You may want a fountain built into your brick paver patio. Elegant may include a statuette. Casual may inspire a small waterfall.

Last, but not least, you’ll want to incorporate landscape lighting into your patio so that it comes alive at night, too. If you think of your brick paver patio as an outdoor-room addition, of course, you’re going to add lights.

Proper choice of fixtures and their placement is key to making the most of your outdoor landscape lighting. You’ll want your landscape lighting to set a tone that fits with your brick paver patio design. You’ll want to highlight features and illuminate traffic areas. Above all, you’ll want just the right soft touch of lighting that gives your brick paver patio that wow effect when guests arrive after dusk.