L&L LOOK BOOK: Beautiful Uses Of Outdoor String Lights [Lighting Ideas Photo Gallery]

String lights are inexpensive and and highly versatile light fixtures. With a little creativity outdoor string lights can turn a room or an object into a beautiful sight, as you will see below. From weddings, DIY projects to building facades, from sculptures to creating canopy ceilings – there are so many different outdoor string lighting ideas and ways they can be used.

Around The Home

DIY Project: Wine Bottle Light by Wit & Whistle

A DIY lamp piece using a wine bottle and string lights

Normal string lights used with decorative flower strings lights to create a ceiling centerpiece

DIY Project: Canvas string lights, instructions at Apartment Therapy

A canvas light painting using string lights

An enchanting bedroom using soft glowing string lights

The string that connects the lights together come in other colors than green. Traditionally used on Christmas trees, the green wires blended into the tree. Here white is used and blends in with the decorations:

White decorative tree branches used with white colored string lights

DIY Project: Paper Cube String Lights by Wit & Whistle

Decorating ordinary outdoor string lights with origami shades

Buy these paper flower lights ready made from Diy or Dont at Etsy

Paper craft tissues can be used to create soft flowers and fixed onto string lights

DIY Project: Ruffled Chiffon by Heart Handmade UK

DIY Ruffled Chiffon Fairy Light Box

You can find these paper cut string light lanterns here

Paper cut lighting by Hannah Nunn

DIY Project: Dixie Cup Light Garland by DIY or Dont

Simple DIY paper cup string lighting

Outdoor Lighting Ideas

DIY Project: Coffee Can Lantern by Maggie Makes. (The DIY project uses votive candles to light the lanterns, but these can be replaced with solar powered string lights stuffed into the can.)

A DIY coffee can lantern

DIY Project: Outdoor Pendant Light by From The Blue Shed

DIY fairy light outdoor pendant lighting

String lights can be hung outdoors to provide pathway lighting:

String lights hanging from a tree lighting a path

Some other outdoor lighting ideas using string lights:

String lights hung side by side outside creating a curtain of lighting

Solar powered string lights lighting up an umbrella on a deck

Mini globe string lights lighting a deck railing

Weddings

Because of their fanciful look, string lights or “fairy lights”, are popular wedding lights.

They can be placed behind fabric to create a more diffused and softer glow of light. LED string lights would work best as they give off less heat.

Here we can see fairy lights being used again for wedding tent lighting, lining the canopy along with with drapery:

An intimate wedding setting

A romantic wedding backdrop

Building and Street Lighting

Hanging string lights side by side to create a curtain of lighting

Hung from the rooftops to mimic a starry night

Hanging across a street in Nice, France

Spread across a larger street

String lights lighting up tress on a river bank

Restaurants

String lights can also be useful for restaurant lighting – creating soft glowing and intimate lighting for romantic indoor or outdoor restaurant areas.

String lights hung to a point in the ceiling can create a canopy of lights.

String lights decorating trees and banisters in a restaurant

Intertwined with strands of a tree

Grape string lights decorating a Greek restaurant

Events and Christmas Lighting

Color coordinating: Traditional string lights are green and red, but as you can see from the photos above there are a whole range of other colors the lights come in. For any events, you can color coordinate the string lights to the theme – Christmas: Red and Green, Weddings: White, Saint Patrick’s Day: Green.