Need ideas to hang/suspend lights without trees or structures

Set a pole into an old tire using concrete. We had movable basketball hoops at school that were made like that and it worked really well.

Why not rent a big tent? It would serve as double duty of some weather protection and giving you a way to hang lights.

Not sure what you are able to get your hands on or if you have anything like this but we are using our tractor to put old telephone poles in the ground for stringing the lights. I would assume you could use a thicker wood post if you can find some long enough? Sorry if it’s not much help!!

Rebar and PVC sounds like it might be a pretty clean look. You’ll also need that kind of heft to support lights.
Do you have any access to maybe a cherry picker or a bucket truck? You could get a maypole/tent effect out of it at the right height, though it’s not particularly elegant.

Gosh I wish I had better pics of this!! At the place we used to live we had a very... ugly, to put it nicely, patio (we lived rent free at the ranch he worked). So to try and make it feel nicer, we got these metal buckets, got a thick PVC pipe, screwed in hooks on top, and cemented them in as well as spray painted them black to hang lights around! Then we put dirt and flowers in the pots 😁

View Quoted Comment Thanks for the thoughts so far! We were trying to avoid renting a big tent. As we are well over budget at this point.

Would you be able to do something like this? We’re in a similar situation, but we’ve got until 2022 to figure it out so still thinking it through.

View Quoted Comment Ooh that looks really pretty

I don't know how big a space you want the lights to cover but here is one idea for a smaller area. Would be perfect over the cake table or head/sweetheart table.

My parents used bamboo to hold up lights in our yard. They called friends who had some growing in their yard and just chopped it down themselves (invasive, not something their friends planted or wanted to keep). They lashed it together with twine to make a trellis and dug holes with a post hole digger for it to sit in.

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I had bamboo in mind too! It grows at my work but I'm not sure our is that thick!