Cafe-style light strands with edison bulbs are a beautiful way to decorate your patio. They are a fantastic and classy way to light up any outdoor space. Wineries, bistros, and night markets use them to create a cozy, intimately lit space that's warm and inviting to diners, and they look fabulous in backyards of just about any size.
These lights are a programmable, addressable version of the cafe market lights you can find at the hardware store. The Sparkle Motion board gives you so many options for programming. It's designed to work with WLED and xLights so you can control the lights wirelessly from your phone or any web enabled browser. Or use Arduino or CircuitPython code to send your own beautiful custom animations to your lights.
These are 12v lights with approximately 8 inches of space between each bulb. Each strand has 20 bulbs and they come with waterproof connectors on each end and an additional connector for power injection at the far end.
I plugged 4 strands into a daisy-chain, for a total of 80 lights, without a noticeable voltage drop.
Adafruit also stocks these in RGBW format! They will perfectly emulate standard cafe lights with a golden yellow / white light color for that classic look (until you bust out the Party Time mode!).
The Adafruit Sparkle Motion board is perfect for this project. It will power 12v lights without needing an additional level shifter or power breakout. For up to around 300 lights you can power directly through the board with 12v.
If you're setting up your lights in a location that's further away from your WiFi router, use the Sparkle Motion with wFL External Antenna. This will extend the WiFi range of the board considerably, so even if your WiFi's not great in your back yard, this board will still be able to reach.
Since this is an outdoor installation, it's a good idea to place the electronics inside a weatherproof box to protect them from the elements. This box is just the right size, and has two cable glands for passing power and data wires.
Power Supply
These lights require a 12v power supply. We have a few in the shop which are great for indoor installations, but if you're putting these out in the garden it's a good idea to look for an outdoor 12v power supply.
Here's the one I ended up using. It's made for landscape lighting, so it's completely weather-proof, and it has some cool additional features like a built-in timer and an automatic light sensor that turns your lights on at sunset.
This one is rated for 60W, which is way more than I need for this strand of lights, but since I am planning on adding additional landscape lighting to my yard, I went with a solution that will allow for some expansion.
I like attaching the board with a JST connector, so if I ever want to remove it to reprogram it or use it for another project, I can just unplug it. This is a little more work at first but saves a lot of time down the road.
You'll also need a tiny flat-head screwdriver to use the screw terminal block on the Sparkle Motion board.
Tools & Additional Materials
- Soldering iron & accessories
- Heat shrink tubing
- Light socket plug adapter, in case you don't have a power outlet handy
Page last edited March 11, 2025
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