Philadelphia City Hall Lit Up at Christmas

City Hall looked cool for the holidays. Every night in December, it was lit up in color using lights.
Here are a couple of pictures I took:



These were taken on the same night. The first is from the west side, the second from the east side. The pattern changed every few days. The Philadelphia Inquirer covered it too.

Posted on Tue, Nov. 29, 2005


This Holiday, See City Hall in a New Light:

Starting tomorrow, the east and west portals will be lit up with brilliant hues in a bid to attract tourists to Center City.

By Marcia Gelbart
Inquirer Staff Writer

It's finally here: some positive light for City Hall.

In a move intended to spur a new type of tourism, the century-old building will be lit up this holiday season in an array of colorful schemes projected onto its east and west portals.

Designed by a French production company, the light display will be unveiled at 5 p.m. tomorrow and continue from 5 p.m. to midnight through Jan. 1. The color schemes will change nightly.

The idea is to build Center City into "a tourist draw where people come in to see
the lit buildings," said Paul R. Levy, president of the Center City District, which is sponsoring the light display.

City Hall is the only participant this year. But, Levy said, "we hope other major building owners and cultural institutions are inspired to expand this effort all over Center City next year."

Tomorrow's event will coincide with Mayor Street's lighting of the traditional City Hall tree, with one nontraditional element.

To prevent any interference with the new light display, the City Hall tree won't be at City Hall. It will be a block away, at JFK Plaza.

In recent years, small portions of City Hall have been illuminated by colorful fluorescent lights. But this year should be "completely different than anything we've done," Levy said.

The cost for the project's design and installation is about $300,000, he said, some
of which is being borne by the Center City District and the Market East Improvement Association.

Levy came up with the idea after returning from a lighting conference in Lyon, France, where he also met the president of the French production company, Artlumiere.

"I realized," he said, "that what we had done in Philadelphia was kindergarten compared to what they did in Europe."

To see more of the patterns, look here. Even more pictures of the Philadelphia City Hall decorative lights here.