Mardi Gras Lights: Purple, Green, And Gold For Fat Tuesday
Three Colors, One Rule
Mardi Gras has the easiest color brief in decorating: purple, green, and gold, and nothing else. The displays that look right stick to it strictly. Add red or cool white and it drifts back toward Christmas. Here's how to get the three colors onto the house in a way that reads from the street, with the right product for each surface.
The Fast Way: A ColorCraft® Mardi Gras Palette
Our Mardi Gras lights collection includes a ColorCraft® Mardi Gras palette string that carries purple, green, and gold in a fixed repeating order on one string. Wrap it around porch columns, tree trunks, and railings and the color balance is handled for you; no juggling three separate strings. It's a 5mm wide-angle string, so it belongs on trees, shrubs, and railings rather than the roofline.
The Roofline: C9 Bulbs
Rooflines take C9 bulbs on a stringer, and for Mardi Gras you have two options. Alternate purple, green, and gold ProCore® C9 bulbs as you screw them in, or run a single color (gold reads best against most siding) and let the palette strings below carry the other two. Clip every socket so the bulbs face the same way.
Layering The Rest Of The House
Columns and railings: the ColorCraft® palette string, spiraled at a consistent pitch.
Shrubs: a purple or green net light draped over each one. Alternate colors down the foundation bed.
Tree trunks: gold 5mm strings at 4-inch spacing. Gold on bark is warm and rich and stands apart from the cooler purple and green around it.
Walkway: purple rope light on lawn stakes, or gold to match the trunks.
Eaves and balconies: if you have a gallery or balcony rail, a run of icicle lights below the C9 line gives the layered look that New Orleans balconies are known for.
Adding Motion
A strobe works for a party display in a way it doesn't for a quiet December one. SuperSpark® C9 strobe bulbs are extremely flashy: every bulb strobes. Screw a few gold ones into a steady purple-and-green roofline for a random sparkle, or run a full string over the feature tree for parade-night energy. For section-by-section motion, a chase controller switches whole strings on and off in sequence: purple, then green, then gold.
Indoors And At The Party
Inside, one palette string around a doorway or along a mantel with beads and masks is plenty. For a courtyard or patio party, string gold patio lights overhead and let the palette strings on the columns do the color.
Installation Notes
Use clips rather than nails or staples. Test each string on the ground. Seal connections with gaskets, plug into GFCI-protected outlets, and put the display on a timer. Mardi Gras season runs from Twelfth Night to Fat Tuesday, so the display is up for weeks; a timer means nobody has to remember it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need all three colors?
Yes. Purple, green, and gold together are what make it read as Mardi Gras. Two out of three looks like something else.
Can I reuse these lights at Christmas?
Purple, green, and gold strings all have December uses, and the C9 stringer and clips are the same ones you'd use for a Christmas roofline. Buy once, use twice a year.
Is gold the same as yellow?
Our gold LEDs are a deep, warm yellow rather than a lemon yellow. Against purple and green it reads as gold, which is exactly what the holiday calls for.
Purple, Green, And Gold, Ready To Hang
Shop the Mardi Gras lights collection for palette strings, C9 bulbs, and nets in all three colors — built to last for many seasons and backed by our Reindeer Proof™ Warranty.
