Why don't people use coloured lights anymore?!

[80sColourfulChristmas]

I was born in the early eighties and I have fond memories of colour, colour & more colour at Christmas! We even had those god-awful foil decorations criss-crossing the ceiling of the living room. Foil honeycomb balls dangling and giant unfolded foil stars.

The foil I don't miss particularly, but what has happened to colourful lights?!

I realise that with the (much needed) switch to LED, the new multi coloured lights aren't quite as pretty as they used to be (why is that?!) but why has this meant that seemingly the majority of people have defaulted to a simple set of boring white lights with just a handful of plain, boring ornaments on their tree?! (Still looks pretty of course it just isn't Christmas as I know it!)

I remember looking admirably at our beautiful tree as a child, stuffed full of all kinds of colourful glass ornaments which had been passed down through my Mum's family from the 1800s. The prettiest tinsel you've ever seen, lametta, beads, bells on beads, the lights had lovely cone shaped 'petals' round them so they glowed beautifully, reflecting off the glass, lametta and tinsel. It was stunning. Fond memories.

Can't have just been us, surely? Anyone else still go for the overloaded, 80s style multicolored Christmas look?!

This year I've ordered LED multi coloured cluster lights for the first time, but still have some traditional style lights for the tree and have used them every year until now. Not sure how pretty our tree is going to look....

We bought the 250 led string lights from Twinkly (John Lewis etc sell them). Expensive but worth it. They look just as good as the videos suggest!

I love traditional coloured lights too. I don't mind the white ones but really not keen on the bright blue ones (especially flashing bright blue ones!)

We have coloured lights! They’re largish multi-coloured bulbs, I’m not a fan of the LED ones. Last year I got lametta too but for some reason it looked shit and I took it off - I love it on other trees and was excited to find some (in Wilko) but it looked really scraggly on our tree.

I don’t really like the blue lights lots of people have on their external decorations - it looks so icy cold, I love warm white lights or multi-coloured.

You need to live where Id do. Coloured lights all over already! I love them!

I have coloured lights. I’ve got multicoloured, pink and purple. I also have tinsel. I’ve been toying with getting a few foil danglies for nostalgia but dh is 6’5” and bangs his head on the light shades as it is. I do love a bit of naff though.

I have white lights, but I like them to set off the coloured decorations on the tree. I have purple and turquoise, with gold and silver to set the rich colour off. Elsewhere in the house I go for rich peacock colours, because I like them.

www.google.co.uk/search?q=crepe+paper+folded+chains&client=safari&hl=en-gb&prmd=isvn&sxsrf=ALeKk01SjACXxPS5QJjkc2HrwUrQZCqI-Q:1606076236291&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjo666c_JbtAhUSsXEKHU8-BpEQ_AUoAXoECAMQAQ&biw=375&bih=633#imgrc=gx_opdRL_m5AnM
I was a child of the 60s and 70s - we all had home made chains of crepe paper

One set of 500 rainbow Christmas lights purchased! I’m excited now.

My grandma use to have ones with flower shaped shades, I loved them.

It has to be coloured lights for me. My exH insisted on white lights amd tried telling me coloured ones were inferior. Thank goodness he's an ex 🎄 The children snd I have just decorated my mum's garden with coloured lights. It looks so festive and cheerful. She's on her own and fed up of her four walls so they have really brightened things up for her. Everything is better with fairy lights.
I have warm white ones on the banister snd cool white in the back garden. I can't abide flashing lights. Give me a headache and they don't make me feel warm, cosy, nostalgic and Christmassy. Just migrainey.

The 80s rocked for Christmas, music and funky fashion.

Because they are ugly & tacky. Vom

@TheFormerPorpentinaScamander get yourself a battery eliminator like this:

www.inspirationswholesale.co.uk/battery-eliminator-2-x-aa.ir

Can get them for three/four AA batteries too (maybe from other retailers though)

The Xmas spirit is strong in the pp!

There you go you've all been told. Your Xmas is ugly and tacky everyone. Happy Christmas!

I agree. Coloured fairy lights are lovely. I particularly like the ones with the little tutu thing. When I was a kid we had two sets which I really liked - one was little coloured lanterns, and the other set were like glass fruits.

White lights aren't what they were either. They are either bright white with a blueish tinge, or warm white with a yellowish tinge.

What happened to white with a white tinge?

I bought so proper coloured shaded lights a couple of years ago in a fit of nostalgia wanting dd to have the same colourful tree I remember as opposed to my tastefully coordinated one. Proper ones that get hot, I think the brand was Pickwick. They sadly have a few burnt out bulbs now that I haven’t bothered to source replacements for.

The shaded ones just have a much warmer light than the LED’s and I’ve noticed that the LED blue and greens tend to overwhelm. I going to experiment with adding a string of red or lantern ones to warm it all up a bit this year.

I’ve also gone back to tinsel! It just smells like Christmas

Bring back Woolworths, that's what I say. They did proper fairy lights in the olden days

Id rather warm white but outvoted by family every year - they do look lovely I’ll admit.

www.onbuy.com/gb/noma-victorian-lanterns-multi-colour-fairy-christmas-lights-x-40-4611~c9627~p6572203/

I also grew up with coloured lights and lots of ceiling decorations.

Now I have white lights on the tree indoors and lovely multicoloured lights that change colour outside. I bought them around 15 years ago from IKEA and noticed last year that some of the lights have stopped working. It will be a shame when I finally have to bin them as they are pretty.

We have coloured lights. Never flashing ones though. Oh no.

I've just put out some coloured berry lights on our bush outside. I hate flashing lights and thought these ones were static but they are not. Actually the colours change very slowly so you barely notice it. b and q lights

Tree is white lights until I can find some good old fashioned coloured lights with the plastic 'flower' on.

We tried warm white lights one year and it looked lovely and classy but left me feeling cold. It has to be coloured lights for me, preferably not LED ones although I did have a a set that were dim leds that were alright but the traditional ones are the best.

I used colour lights with prooer bulbs for years and then moved to warm white for both my trees, I also have a set of cold white fir when I go for a silver, white and blue ice theme. All that said my girls were talking about how they fondly remembered the coloured lights when they were very small and i decided that next year, Chrustmas 21, I will go with what I would call an old fashioned theme. Thus I have ordered the largest set of string multicoloured LED lights they have in Argos. Are the coloured LEDs really horrible?

Coulred lights for me,the new ones drive me mad as i have to scroll through many light effects to get them static 🤬 i just want to switch them on and,whola lovely colored tree lights. 60's child

OP those foil decorations you mentioned give me lovely nostalgia feels of Christmas as a kid in the 70s. :-) I miss them. If I could get my hands on some more I'd totally put them up.

We have coloured lights but they aren't as colourful anymore. You only have 4 colours now whereas there were lots of different colours on the old ones.
I hate the cold white or blue lights. I'm not keen on colour schemes for trees either especially blue or pink. Just no.