On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
I love all these holiday lights so much! So here a bonus Christmas lights OTR for New Year’s Eve. (morning)
ema
Redshift’s Miracle on 34th Street (https://balloon-juice.com/2023/12/29/on-the-road-redshift-baltimores-miracle-on-34th-street/) reminded me that, when it comes to extravagant holiday decorations, we need to take a stroll through Dyker Heights.
Dyker Heights is a rich neighborhood in Brooklyn where people* put out elaborate Christmas decorations to the delight of hundreds of thousands of visitors who go to the area every year, to admire the shiny spectacle. I was there about one week ago, filming and oohing and aahing with everyone else.
(* A local resident, Lucy Spata, started the tradition in the 1980s. Today most people pay professional companies to set up the decorations.)
WaterGirl
This was scheduled for 5 am, but it didn’t publish. I just discovered it now. On the bright side, early-rising California peeps can enjoy a fresh OTR instead of the usual middle-of-the-night publication time.
Happy New Year!
moops
yay morning thread. Thank god for LED lights. I remember elaborate neighbor displays decades ago where you needed to run your own generator to power the display because the standard home is not wired to pull that many amps from the grid.
Baud
Whoa. That’s a lot of lights.
WaterGirl
Zoom Reminder:
New Year’s Eve zoom at 7-9 pm Eastern
New Year’s Day zoom at 1-3 pm Eastern, so some of our BJ peeps around the world can join!
send email if you want the zoom link.
WaterGirl
@Baud: I wonder if they have a rule – all lights have to go off at 10pm, or something like that?
In Champaign-Urbana, we have “Candlestick Lane” and all the kids and some of the adults always drove to that neighborhood to see all the lights and decorations. When my nieces would visit at Christmas every year, it was a must-see event.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
Only blue states would impose a sleep fiat like that.
Gin & Tonic
We went to view that area a couple of years ago (my daughter and SIL live in Brooklyn, but different area.) Over-the-top is an inadequate description.
pat
@Gin & Tonic:
My first thought was holy crap.
That was my second thought too.
Wyatt Salamanca
I went to see this Christmas Lights display a few years prior to COVID and it was a blast.
Podcast episode about the history of the Dyker Heights Christmas Lights
https://www.boweryboyshistory.com/2019/12/the-history-of-the-dyker-heights-christmas-lights-an-electric-holiday-tradition-illuminates-brooklyn.html
A Walk Through the Dyker Height Christmas Lights display
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQGX4ior9Jk
MelissaM
No “dittos” there, eh? Probably fastest way to get your house egged, and they probably hire out for that, too! “Professional house egging! Guaranteed aim! $1200 per dozen”
BigJimSlade
@MelissaM: And Martha Stewart can show you how to make an omelette with those eggs!
Jeffg166
But is it enough?
There are videos on YouTube of it.
Brachiator
Whoa, that’s a lot of lights!
I’ve seen some notable displays here in Southern California, but rarely as excessive as some of these.
But these are also pretty cool.
SkyBluePink
Wow! Christmas heaven!
NotMax
Reminded of a New Yorker cartoon from long ago.
A couple on the sidewalk staring at a particularly garish display on an otherwise subdued street.
Caption: “They must be very religious.”
:)
trollhattan
I like this Maurice Sendak Nutcracker house in Seattle.
https://www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/ballard-nutcracker-house-returns-after-year-of-uncertainty/
The heck do they store this stuff the rest of the year?
Ohio Mom
Around these parts, in southwest Ohio, the most elaborate displays have traditionally been in working class neighborhoods, which makes an interesting contrast to the wealth of Dyker Heights. Something for a sociologist to ponder.
In recent years there has been an upswing in exurbia, where techie-dads get into the programming aspects of setting up lights to sync with music.
This was the first year in a long time we limited our Christmas display touring to only a couple of nights. Visited some old favorites mostly. That sated me.
Alison Rose
There was a house in the city I grew up in that not only did an elaborate display outside (although not quite THIS many lights), but turned the whole inside into a Christmas display, and you could visit and take a little tour through the house. At first I thought that sounded weird…why would I want to walk around some stranger’s house just to see their Christmas stockings and stuff. But a friend assured me it was worth it, so I went with her one year in high school, and it really was! They basically turned the entire first floor of the house into a massive Christmas diorama or something. Light displays all over the rooms, a huge Christmas train set in the living room with all sorts of animatronics and music, evergreen boughs around the ceilings, etc etc. They were a super friendly family and IIRC they also handed out cookies as you left.
Parfigliano
@SkyBluePink: Pictures of my idea of hell.
WaterGirl
@Parfigliano: I, for one, am glad that Ema took the time to share these with us – I had no idea that any of this existed.
Just like her amazing pictures of Central Park – until she started sending those in, I had no idea that Central Park was a place of beauty and not just the scary place in NYC where people get murdered on TV shows.
mrmoshpotato
Wow. That’s wild.
mrmoshpotato
@Gin & Tonic:
How about under-the-bottom?
ema
@Jeffg166:
Here you go, 22:32 minutes of Dyker Heights Christmas Lights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJRmCdzu7ck
Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to all!
Miss Bianca
@trollhattan: Tried to click on that article but the Seattle Times in its infinite wisdom informed me that I had an ad blocker on my browser so I wouldn’t be able to.
Uh…guys? No I don’t. See, this is the browser that *doesn’t* have the ad blocker. Wankers.
Happy New Year!
oldster
On the one hand, I am glad that enterprising crafters have created a business niche in decorating rich people’s houses. Spread that wealth!
On the other hand, what is wrong with rich people that they don’t want the fun of putting up their own lights? It can be a family activity or a solitary pleasure. But why hire it out? Do they hire people to chew their food for them, too?
Librarian
I don’t think I would call Dyker Heights a “rich” neighborhood; it’s more upper middle class-middle class, though there are many rich folks there. It is, or at least was, primarily, or at least highly, populated by people of Italian descent- it’s adjacent to Bath Beach and Bensonhurst-, and I’ll bet that some of those who have these lights are, or have been, shall we say, affiliated with the mob, or with those that have mob connections.
Memory Pallas
We are New Yorkers who visit Dyker Heights most Christmases. My favorite display this year (I think it was right across the street from the house in the first image) was a big vinyl banner with one string of lights above that read “Bah, humbug!” This year there were many food trucks and souvenir carts officializing the street party atmosphere. Time Out NY lists this as the best place to see Christmas decoration in the city – better than Rockefeller Center and the department stores. I heard people speaking French, German and Italian on the streets and the subway there and back (also languages from Asia that I couldn’t ID.)
WaterGirl
@Miss Bianca: You browser must have some built-in protections the block them from whatever it is they are trying to do on your computer. :-)
Origuy
In San Jose, Willow Glen is the neighborhood to go for Christmas displays. My orienteering club puts on an event every year where someone maps interesting displays and comes up with multiple-choice questions that have to be answered when you get to the house. I did some of the course planning this year. Then we have a potluck social afterwards. There are a few houses that are as over the top as the ones in the pictures, including one that collects money for Make-A-Wish which also has Santa and Mrs. Claus in the evenings. In one area, the neighbors co-operate to do a theme on each street.
BruceJ
Here in tucson there’s an entire subdivision that has ‘You must put up a Christmas Display” written into the covenants. They have to put up serious traffic control every year to handle the crowds.
https://www.winterhavenfestival.org/
Now sponsored by the local Electric utility
trollhattan
@BruceJ: That’s begging for the fir-twig-in-clothespin treatment. :-)
Redshift
That’s seriously over there top!
way2blue
Wow.