By Liz Nye, New England Botanic Garden
November 2024
One spectacular but often unsung feature of Night Lights at New England Botanic Garden is found along the forested edge of The Ramble, NEBG’s garden for children and families. During Night Lights, The Ramble in particular makes everyone feel like a kid. The “Curiosity Cottage” is aglow, the “Twigloo” is frosted with white lights, colorful crystals surround the clover lawn, and a nostalgia-inspiring model train chugs along cheerily under The Ramble Pavillion. The magic of these displays only grows as visitors look up into the trees where fairy lights bounce around the branches in twinkling shades of green and red. The wonder of these subtly sparkling lights is near impossible to capture in photos, yet they mesmerize the young and young at heart, inspiring exclamations like, “How do they do that!” and “I want those lights at my house!”
While Night Lights’ impressive displays and generally dazzling vibes are truly one-of-a-kind (don’t miss the opportunity to get your tickets now!), we don’t mind “lifting the curtain” on some of the magic — shining a light on how we deck out the Gardens so you can capture some of the joy of Night Lights experience at home this holiday season.
Step 1: Create
Bringing Night Lights to life involves months of planning and thousands of hours of staff and volunteer time. A lot of that time is spent creating, meticulously hand crafting components of the displays — think of the flowers that make up the upside-down garden in the Limonaia! We also think creatively about the types of features that will help make the visitor experience that much more memorable. Are there enough cozy places to connect with friends and loved ones? Where can people take that perfect group photo? Is the atmosphere all at once comfortable, fun, and festive? Are traditions reflected alongside the nontraditional? Ask these same questions as you decorate at home and you’ll fill your space with the spirit of Night Lights.
Step 2: Gather 
Night Lights is all about gathering people together to make memories during this special time of year. To make Night Lights a success, we gather people, sure, but also things — lots of things — reusing and repurposing the humblest of items into artful holiday displays. Look closely during your Night Lights visit and you’ll see festive trees built from garden stakes and hundreds of plastic bottles that have been given a second life as illuminated flowers. Of course, natural materials play a role, too. Our own willows supply branches for a beautiful, illuminated archway and festive container arrangements feature evergreens mixed with willow wood, birch branches, and ink berry harvested from the property. To bring home the magic of Night Lights, try your hand at crafting your own bottle flowers or learn more about ideal plants for creating festive winter arrangements.
Step 3: Illuminate
Last but certainly not least, the lights. It’s the darkest time of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, so it only makes sense that we find joy and comfort in celebrations of light. From grand and glorious to simple and subdued, there are so many ways to incorporate light into your home holiday decoration. While some of the biggest and boldest illuminated features at Night Lights, like orbs and crystals, are purchased wholesale from suppliers, LED string lights that are widely available make up much of our displays. As a botanic garden, we like to highlight the plant material as much as we can with our lights. We wrap trees with string lights to show off their forms in winter and use uplighting to create dramatic, elongated views of tree trunks and branches. At home, you can focus on spotlighting the beauty of natural features, too. We can say from experience that this will earn you oohs and ahhs from neighbors, family, and friends this holiday season.
So, there you have it. Create, gather, illuminate — the secret sauce of Night Lights. Experience the magic first-hand now through January 5, 2025.
Liz Nye is the Public Relations Manager at New England Botanic Garden. She holds a master’s degree in science writing from Johns Hopkins University and enjoys learning about and writing about all things plants.