Event and wedding lighting hire in Alicante and Spain

Lighting is the most underrated part of event technology. Everyone remembers the sound, but the people who think about light are the ones who have already seen their wedding photos taken in a dark garden. We bring the rig, install it and run it through the evening.

This page is about lighting only. If you need a full package with a sound engineer, start with sound and lighting hire; here we go into what the lights themselves do, how many scenes an evening needs and what to check at the venue.

Why an event needs its own lighting

Once the sun has set, a venue with no lights effectively ceases to exist, for the guests and for the camera. Darkness falls quickly in Spain, and most celebrations here happen outdoors, where there are no ceiling lights at all.

Besides visibility, good lighting gives you:

• Photos and video, because no photographer, however expensive, can pull a picture out of the dark;
• Atmosphere, since warm light on the trees and the facade turns an ordinary garden into a magazine location;
• Zoning, so guests sense where the drinks are, where the dance floor is and where to sit and talk;
• The rhythm of the evening, calm for dinner and lively for dancing;
• Safety, on steps, paths and changes of level in the garden.

A practical rule: if the party runs past sunset and is not in a hall with chandeliers, you need lighting. It is not decoration but a basic technical requirement.

What lighting hire includes

• Stage lighting that floods the stage and the performance area;
• Architectural lighting for the facade, trees, walls and the ceremony arch;
• Controlled dynamic lighting for the dance floor;
• Decorative string lights and warm lines over the dining area;
• Control through the evening, with scenes that change for each part of the programme;
• Installation, cable runs and dismantling.

The fixtures in a lighting package

• Wash lights, which evenly light the performance area or the whole venue;
• Colour fixtures, which set the mood and change between parts of the evening;
• Moving fixtures, which add movement and beams over the dance area;
• Architectural uplighting for walls, trees, the facade and the ceremony arch;
• Warm string lights over the dining area, the most visible part of the magazine picture;
• A control desk, so that scenes change during the evening instead of staying static.

Three lighting scenes for one evening

Good lighting is never a single setting. It needs at least three modes:

• Ceremony: soft and warm, flattering to the couple, without dazzling guests or getting in the photographer’s way;
• Dinner: subdued, with accents on the tables and the architecture, so it is cosy and people can see their food;
• Dancing: dynamic and colourful, with movement over the dance floor.

Our technician switches between the scenes to an agreed timetable, so you do not have to think about it in the middle of the party.

Lighting and your photographer

This problem usually comes up only after the wedding, when the photos arrive.

• Coloured light on faces is fine on the dance floor but ruins pictures during the ceremony;
• A fixture pointing into the lens bleaches half the frame;
• A table area that is too dark forces the photographer to use flash, and the atmosphere disappears;
• Some cheap fixtures flicker, which shows up as stripes on video.

If you introduce us to your photographer, we agree the plan beforehand. It is a five-minute conversation that can save a wedding album.

How much electricity does lighting need?

This is the key question, and it is settled before the event, not on installation day. An old finca, a villa or a country house often has no spare capacity for a full sound and lighting package, and then a generator is needed.

Before you book a venue, find out how many free kilowatts there are, where the fuse board is and whether there is a separate line. Tell us the location and we will suggest what to ask the management.

Where lighting matters most

• Gardens and fincas around Elche, Murcia and Jávea, where there is no ready-made lighting and we build everything from scratch;
• Private villas in Marbella and Calpe, with the same story plus the electricity question;
• Seaside venues, where wind demands sturdier fixing of the structures;
• Stone farmhouses near Barcelona, where heritage sites can restrict fixings.

For a villa party in particular, read our guide to a celebration at a private villa.

How long does lighting take to install?

Longer than sound, and that is what to build into the venue timetable: cable runs across the garden, rigging the fixtures, aiming and programming the scenes. For a medium venue it takes 2 to 3 hours, and for a large one with architectural lighting, more. For that reason the question of when the venue is available matters more for lighting than for any other part of the kit.

Lighting with sound, stage, screen and musicians

Lighting is most often ordered as part of a bundle with sound, and where the venue calls for it a stage and a screen join the bundle. For a programme as well, we bring a band such as Royal Band or a small line-up from the duo and trio page, playing on the same equipment. A real example is the festival stage in Barcelona, where we supplied sound and lighting, about two vehicle-loads of kit.

Lighting hire: delivery zones

The fixtures leave Alicante in cases. Calpe, 65 km away, is close enough that transport hardly changes the price, while Jávea at 90 km is an ordinary working trip. Barcelona is 530 km away, and for a job that far we work to a plan made in advance, with the crew staying overnight. The lights can go further afield too: our limit is about 700 km from Alicante, which takes in the rest of Spain and the south of France. The cities page covers each place in more detail.

How to hire lighting for your event

1. Message us with the date, the town and venue, the kind of event and an estimate of the guest list;
2. We check our diary and send a quote on the same day;
3. Next we ask about the electricity supply, volume rules, set-up time and access, calling the venue if that is quicker;
4. With the conditions agreed, we book your date;
5. A few weeks before the party we fix the timing of each lighting scene;
6. On the day the crew comes early, rigs the fixtures and tests every scene before guests turn up;
7. When the evening ends we strip the rig and take it away, leaving nothing for you to clean.

When to order the lighting depends only on how busy that day is. Write the date, we check and reply.

Lighting, sound and musicians in one pair of hands

Normally the lights come from one firm, the band from another and the rigging from a third. We do it differently and supply performers and technology together, which is what sets Team5 apart.

• Responsibility sits in one place, so a problem is never passed on to a supplier outside the team;
• The band is used to our gear and does not lose time at its first set working out an unknown desk;
• The engineer knows these songs after hundreds of plays and knows when to push the vocals up;
• The venue has to admit only one crew, once, rather than a string of specialists;
• All questions go to a single person, not three.

At parties, technical failures happen most often at the joins between contractors. Inside one contractor’s work they are rarer.

Further reading

• CODART festival in Barcelona, a case study of sound and lighting for a contest stage;
• Technical rider, a short guide to the document and to using it when assessing a venue;
• How to choose an event venue, what to put to the venue before a deposit is paid;
• What sound, lighting and stage hire includes, covering the kit, installation and the engineer for the whole evening;
• The Abbey Tavern case, showing how light and sound work at a live evening.

Frequently asked questions