A glittery festive season

As the skyline darkens in December – which in the various Australian states can be anywhere from 6.30ish to 8.30ish – you will see people wandering around their neighbourhood, marvelling at the beautiful twinkling lights and elaborate nativity scenes on front lawns.

The tradition of putting up Christmas lights had much humbler beginnings, dating back to the 16^th century when Lutheran Christians in Germany started decorating their Christmas trees with candles, symbolising Christ as the ‘light of the world’.

When electric lights were introduced, the decorations became more elaborate and weren’t used just on the inside Christmas tree but also to brighten outside. Today, many towns and communities have friendly competitions to recognise the most creative Christmas light displays in their area.

In the northern hemisphere, where Christmas falls in the depth of winter, there are several famous light displays, such as in Regent Street, London; the Champs-Elysees in Paris; and the Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen to name a few. The Rockefeller Centre’s Christmas Tree in New York is synonymous with the holiday season in the United States.

Having lived on the other side of the world for several years, I can vouch for how uplifting it can be to see these light displays when it is cold and dark not long after 4pm. When our family lived in the mountains near Denver, Colorado, we became enamoured with the spectacular Christmas lights that brought our neighbourhood to life each December.

As we discovered, our neighbours believed it was their civic duty to string up thousands of Christmas lights in their yards, with some going the extra mile by providing piped music and a cup of warm eggnog as you passed by! Needless to say, after our first Christmas there our family decided we had to join the excitement and get involved.

This meant several visits throughout the year to large homewares stores, stockpiling many strands of lights that were on sale. Then came the endless days of standing on a ladder to string them up and connecting countless extension cords together to illuminate an enormous Santa at the front of the house. It was with much joy – and relief – when we flicked the switch for the first time and saw the reward for all our efforts. It was truly a Griswold moment!

However, on our return to Australia we lacked the enthusiasm for stringing up rows and rows of lights on our suburban house. Maybe it was because our kids were older, so the wonder of Christmas lights in their eyes had waned somewhat. There was also the issue that the sun didn’t go down until late, so by the time the lights went on we were almost ready to go to bed. And it was difficult to justify the cost of the electricity when our display could only be seen by someone able to cast their eyes over our 1.8m front fence.

Suffice to say, we settled for one strand of flickering candle lights on our inside tree (which was fake and not like the beautiful smelling pine trees we had meticulously picked each year while overseas) and left it at that.

Now a couple of decades later my passion for viewing Christmas lights has been reignited. As December nears, I find myself scouring the lists of streets which will have the ‘best’ displays. During this research I stumbled upon Peg and Bill Chartres, who have been participating in the Christmas Lights Display at Lobethal, in the Adelaide Hills, since 1983.

Their beautiful display is so well known that when they subdivided their property in 2014 the local council renamed their driveway ‘Christmas Lane’. In 2022 they were honoured with a Civic Award for their long contribution to the town’s lights display, which is the largest of its kind in South Australia.

Peg, 75 and Bill, 84 both admit to suffering from that shocking disease, ‘Christmaslightous’. They say despite the effort required for testing, putting up and taking down more than 50,000 lights each year, it is all worthwhile when they see the joy on the faces of the thousands of people who visit their display.

“It’s a good feel thing really,” says Peg.

“Because we are set back from the road, people park their cars and walk onto the property. We sit outside and talk to everyone and some people who come with their family tell us they used to remember coming here when they were children, with their mum and dad.

“People just thank us for doing it.”

Peg adds that many visitors in recent times have included refugees who are new to Australia and have not seen Christmas lights before, as well as large numbers from the Indian community in nearby Adelaide.

Over the four plus decades of being involved in the festival, the couple has embraced the different lighting options available – from the strings of big festoon lights in the 80s, through to bud lights, and now LED lights which are more cost efficient.

“Christmas lights don’t draw a lot of power and the period of the year when the lights are on it is not usually that hot here … it’s very surprising but it’s always been our smallest electricity bill,” Peg explains.

The biggest commitment in creating such a spectacular display is their time. As they age and slow down, the Chartres now find themselves preparing their garden and starting the process of unpacking and testing the lights in September. In January they begin the long task of putting away the lights for another season.   

“Each year we say we’re not doing it again … but we’re still doing it,” Peg laughs. “We will just assess it every year to see how we are going.”

Fingers crossed they will continue bringing joy to people like me who love Christmas lights for many years to come.

We encourage you to share and use this material on your own website. However, when using materials from Majellan Media’s website, please include the following in your citation:  Sourced from www.majellan.media