Lighting, whether from candles or strings of LED lights, makes a room magical: keep it simple. Throw a string of fairy lights over a bowl of Christmas clementines to turn them into a sparkling centrepiece or set a trio of candlelit hurricane lamps on a sideboard to set a romantic atmosphere.
WASH WALLS AND WINDOWS
Give windows the five star treatment with a cascade of five wire-framed stars of different sizes, each wrapped with LED microlights. The Osby Star Curtain Light has a width of 1.2m and a drop of 1m, and has a 5m lead cable and 6 hour timer function; £79.99 from Lights4fun. Similar single stars, B & Q.
* A cascade of shimmering lights will make a plain wall wonderful. Naked Wire Curtain Lights, £45, offers delicated strands of light on long, clear strings, £45 from Cox & Cox.
TRANSFORM THE DINING TABLE
* Scatter tiny lights down the table that are decorative even when they’re unlit: A garland of gypsophila blossom comes to life with 100 LED lights along its 1.7m length, £55 from Cox & Cox. Twinkling, tiny LED stars along a 4m length of fine copper wire look enchanting when woven in and around wine glasses and tableware, £22, The White Company, and come complete with timer to prevent energy wastage.
* A trio of freestanding allium table lights, resembling starbursts on stems, look spectacular ranged down the dining table; from Sarah Raven, 45cm high, £21.57 each.
* Elevate the effect of flickering tealights by dropping each one into a white IKEA recycled steel Samverka holder, 8cm high, that has a cutwork leaf-and-bird design, to make great shadow play; £1 each.
CREATE A CANDLELIT GLOW
* Take one clear glass trifle bowl, fill with water, add a set of floating candles and a few seasonal flowerheads such as hellebores and WOW. A light-infused centrepiece. Set of ten floating candles from The Range are pebble-shaped so they don’t tip into the water, and have a burn time of 2.5 hours; £2.49.
* Hurricane lamps set with pillar candles are classic, but this season, add some fairy dust: swap the candle for a cluster of battery-operated string lights, crammed into the space to create myriad of twinkling lights. Use cylindrical glass storage jars to great effect, filling them with white and silver glass baubles, fairy lights threaded through; IKEA’s set of three storage jars, from 28cm to 17cm, are just £10.
* No need to worry about leaving a room with lit candles when you can just move your hand over them to turn them on and off; IKEA’s LED pillar candle, with a USB port on the underside and a rechargeable battery, produces a cosy, flickering light that resembles a real candle flame; in three different sizes, from £5.
* Lights4fun’s votive candles are LED lit but are wax-based and even have authentic dripping wax captured down their sides; set of 4, £21.99.
LIGHT UP THE BALCONY
* Give topiary and shrubs a glow up with battery-operated light nets that are invisible during the day but at night, transform the foliage with little floating lights; warm white LED topiary net in varying sizes from £12.99, Lights4fun.
* Trail micro lights in and around windowboxes and troughs, garland around obelisks: battery fairy lights on green cable, £14.99, Lights4fun.
* Use white plants to create light on both sides of the windows: Connect balcony table and dining table with displays of white cyclamen in wide terracotta bowls, lit by silvered hurricane lamps. Indoor cyclamen are large flowered; outdoor cyclamen have smaller, daintier blooms and are hardier.
White and silver twiggy stems, foraged from the florist’s, are indispensable. Prod the stems into the compost of all your outdoor potted plants to create a magical white forest, and continue Narnia indoors with silvery champagne or builders’ buckets, first filling with polystyrene chips of chicken wire, and mulching with small silver baubles.
STRICTLY SEASONAL
And so much fun: A trio of iridescent parcels, resembling giant cubes of shimmering ice, bow-tied with cellophane, are LED lit and battery operated; £34.49 from B & Q, online only.