We are on July 30, so in Vigo they are doing what proceeds at this point of the year, at least there. In exultant tone and accompanied by several of his councilors, the mayor of the city, Abel Caballero, gave for officially initiated This morning the Christmas decoration campaign. Yes, we are in summer. And yes, it’s hot. But that does not mean that in Vigo they are already dustying the lights.
For something It is claimed as the world capital of Christmas.
Vigo at 35º. It’s hot. Even in the streets of Vigo, which usually enjoy a benign microclimate guaranteed by the Atlantic and the estuary. Despite that and that Meteogalicia hopes that today the 35ºC of maximum In the city, its mayor has dusted Christmas ornaments. Literally.
Accompanied by several of his councilors and in full Porta do Sol, in the urban heart of Vigo, Abel Caballero sediment Together with several Christmas garlands and started the assembly of the ornaments. “We started in July, even with a substantive heat, because riding Christmas is a very complex process.”
Shocking? Not so much. Probably the most surprising thing is that the fact that Caballero is hanging Christmas lights in the middle of summer already has little surprising. Did exactly the same a year ago. Then the vigués mayor, surrounded by the same people, on the same place and the same day (July 30) also announced that the city would begin to immediately deploy its Christmas ornament.
Not only do they coincide day, place and staging. Like last year, Caballero has also refused to go beyond the strictly scheduled (posing with the ornaments) and did not want to specify when the lights will turn on. “It’s a state secret,” he ironized. It is probably in November (in 2024 it was 16), But in recent years the announcement of the date has come accompanied by another staging on the same street with A clock That marks the countdown.
Are there so many lights? Yes. Caballero took advantage of the appointment to remember that the city will display millions of LED lights (around 11.5 millionto be precise) along hundreds and hundreds of streets. This year, Caballero clarifiedwill be 460, 40 more that in 2024. The city will be adorned with 7,000 ornamental motifs such as the ones it showed today to astonish tourists who pass with a cap and sandals.
Caballero also revealed that special lights will be used in woodland to not damage them and slid that this year (again) there will probably be surprises related to the size of the mega Christmas tree. At the moment he did not want to reveal how much will exactly measure to prevent others from “copying.”
Beyond the show. The mixture of show, virality and waste of LED lights seems to have worked to the city, which in a matter of a few years has managed to take a 180 degree turn to its Christmas: to be a time without major importance, than the hospitality of the city even considered a low season, it has become a real mass phenomenon, with hotels and bars full, saturated streets and riades of tourists from other cities.
How many? To specify it is not easy. Between November 1, 2024 and January 31, 2025, the INE counted some 138,300 visitors housed in hotels in Vigo. Not all people who come to the city to enjoy the lights spend the night in it (many arrive from other points of the community or the province), but still the global balance that the City Council is managed is surprisingly high. Recently gentleman He came to ensure That “at Christmas we count 6.3 million visitors in one day.” Not bad for a city of 300,000 inhabitants.
Beyond Vigo. Vigo’s zeal for becoming the great reference of Christmas has reached such an extreme that last year the City Council He installed posters Announcing their Christmas lights in Rome, London, Paris and New York, where Spaniards found them who ended up sharing their astonishment in networks. “I was seeing this in a lot and I couldn’t believe it,” tweet An X user next to a photo in which a poster installed in Manhattan was seen.
The Galician city is not the only one that has been launched to Christmas frenzy. In recent years, the perspective of becoming a busy tourist point in December has attracted Other municipalitiessuch as Badalona, Madrid or Malaga, which has generated an authentic “War of Lights”. Not surprisingly if you consider that Vigo estimates in 800 million The economic return of the parties.
Images | Vigo City Council
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