How We Made Our Home Work Smarter, not Harder

This post is sponsored by Legrand

There’s always a huge learning curve when moving into a new home – getting used to the new sounds, creating new routines, remembering what drawer the silverware is in, and of course…figuring out what light switches operate what lights! When you’ve figured those things out – that’s when it feels like home!

These days, I’m forever running around behind our two year old and turning off lights that she’s turned on and always find myself reaching for the wrong switch – ugh! From the outside looking in, I’m positive our neighbors have wondered why the lights keep going on and off – a combination of a toddler who likes to play around and a Mom who has no clue which switch operates which lights!

I knew there had to be an easier way to control the lighting in our home without spending countless hours of the day reaching for the wrong switch. That’s when I turned to Legrand and the Radiant Collection with a full offering of dimmers, outlets, and switches that allow me to take back control and automate all our lighting needs without ever having to lift a finger. Literally.

We were already familiar with the brand after having installed the Legrand Adorne collection in our previous home so we knew it was a brand we could trust and feel confident in. We used and loved the lighting controls there for 3 years and were sad to leave them behind. So when Legrand offered to outfit our living room with modern low-profile outlets and paddle switches with built in smart technology – we jumped at the chance to make our home work smarter, not harder. Did I mention that they’re gorgeous too?

After taking inventory of all the outlets and switches in our living area I hopped on the Legrand site and began browsing the Radiant collection – umm…holy cow the selections! It was a little overwhelming at first seeing all of the options until I was able to really sit down and *think* – how do I want these to work for our home? What do I want them to do? What would make my life easier? There was a solution for every need!

Once I sorta wrapped my head around those answers, I was able to easily identify what I needed each switch and outlet to do for our family so that our home was working for us, and not against us. Here’s what we choose:

1. Smart switches to control all our exterior lights and interior hallway lights. Switches connect to Wi-Fi and can be controlled from an app on any device or through voice command prompts via Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa to turn lights on/off.
2. Smart dimmer switch to control our overhead living room lights. Switch connects to Wi-Fi and can be controlled from an app on any device or through voice command prompts via Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa to dim lights and/or turn on/off.
3. Tamper resistant outlets with integrated night lights. Night light comes with 4 brightness settings and turns on/off based on surrounding ambient light.
4. Tamper resistant outlets with integrated USB charging ports. Can charge 2 phones simultaneously.

To install our outlets we first removed the outlet cover.

Next, we plugged in our outlet tester – this $5 tool is essential for a task like this! We use it two fold – first…we plugged it into the outlet we were about to change out. When the outlet is powered, the lights on the tester light up like so, but when the breaker is flipped off the lights on the tester go off and indicates to us that we’ve turned off power to the correct outlet. Always, always turn off power from the panel before taking on any electrical project!

• 

• 

Once power was turned off, we double checked that our power was truly off with our voltage tester before beginning install.

Then we read the super simple instructions and began install of our new nightlight outlets – no extra wiring required for the nightlight function! After watching the first outlet go in, I felt confident enough that I could do the rest on my own – it was that simple!

• 

• 

Once the wiring was complete, we flipped the breaker back on and plugged the outlet tester back in to verify our install. The outlet tester quickly identifies the most common wiring faults in standard 3-wire outlets and verifies operation of GFCI protected outlets all with the help of a couple indicator lights that’ll tell you exactly what you did wrong.

After verifying that we had wired up the outlet correctly, we popped on the screw-less wall plate and moved onto installing our switches. Totally loving the integrated night light to help us navigate our way around the new house in the dark!

Installing the outlets were easy breezy but the switches proved to be a bit more challenging in all honesty. Our house has additional wire drops in each junction box which was a little head scratching at first but in the end we were able to figure it out rather quickly.

When it came time to connect our smart switches so that we could operate them from an app on our phone, we ran into a few connection issues but the customer service team at Legrand was very helpful and walked us through every step of the process – even express shipping an extra dimmer switch when the one we had installed would turn the lights on but wouldn’t turn them off – no questions asked!

Not only am I impressed with the Radiant Collection from Legrand, but I was even more impressed with their level of customer service too! The best part? All our lights, and a couple of our outlets can be controlled via Google voice commands and an easy-to-use app right on our phone! A Mom’s dream!

I’m so grateful to Legrand for partnering with us on this project and helping us make our home work smarter. Small improvements like this puts us one step closer to making our house feel like home and I don’t know about you…but when I know what drawer the silverware lives in and what switches operate what lights, it feels like home for sure!