Icicle lights

Measuring for icicle lights

Measure the gutter or fascia run you want to cover and add a metre, so the first drop starts at the corner rather than a metre in. A 5.8m set does a porch or a bay; 8.8m does the front of a terrace house; 11.8m does a semi; 23.8m does a detached house or both sides of a garage. The unlit lead back to the plug is listed separately on each product page, because the socket is usually indoors and the cable has to come through a window or a wall vent.

Snowing or static

Nineteen of the 22 sets are snowing, which means each drop carries a sequence of LEDs that light in turn from top to bottom, so the whole run looks like water falling. Static sets hang lit without movement and are quieter to look at. Both come in warm white, white, and a blue-and-white mix that reads as ice.

Fixing them

Gutter clips, sold with most sets or under accessories, hook over the edge of a gutter and hold the cable. Under a fascia or along a beam, use cable clips every 50cm so the drops hang straight. The LEDs and cable are sealed; the transformer is not, so it lives indoors or inside a weatherproof box.

Timers

Every snowing set has a timer: switch on at dusk the first evening and it repeats six hours on, eighteen off, each day. That matters on a set fixed to a gutter where the plug is not easy to reach.