This article was published in the July 2024 edition of the Spotlight News Magazine.

Dreamy holidays start in the summer sunshine

By Dayna Harpster

You, too, can have the Christmas décor of your dreams.

Let’s say you have a budget that’s dreamy, to start.

Do you want red and white ornaments that look like huge candies? Earth tones and denim? Pink and purple and sweet?

Are you looking to decorate the interior or exterior of your home?

So many questions but they’re all so much fun to answer, and the biggest advice the folks at Light Up Naples have is to go ahead and get into that Christmas in July spirit. Last year, half of their holiday customers locked in their reservations in July.

“Light Up Naples” owner Katie O’Flinn explained how the calendar works in the holiday-lighting business: The first part of the year is for taking down decorations, maintenance and ordering; spring and summer are for selling the displays to come during the second half of the year; post-Labor Day, installations start.

Do you wonder why you don’t notice that a large retail establishment has some of its holiday lighting up in the fall? That’s because the lights stay off and unplugged until later in the year.

“It’s a year-round business for sure,” O’Flinn said.

With displays starting at $2,500, and an average cost of more than $5,000, it pays to talk yuletide when the sun is at its peak. That way the customer is sure to get what they want, O’Flinn explained. Sometimes vendors sell out of the trending items, she says.

And what are they? O’Flinn and designer Ryan Gardner can tell you from attending market shows early in the year that Holiday 2024 is all about textures, neutral colors, vintage, “and the silver tinsel tree of your grandma’s,” O’Flinn said. “Fairy lights” are big, meaning the tiny 3 millimeter “rice lights” as they’re known in the business. And you wouldn’t think brown would be a Christmas color, O’Flinn said, but vendors actually sold out of a mocha hue last year, so if mocha is your choice, order early.

Also trending is upsizing the tabletop tree look to full-scale, said Gardner. The biggest trend, though, Gardner said, is “what makes you happy.”

The largest tree “Light Up Naples” designed and installed last year was quite a bit more than a tabletop. It was a 20-foot-tall extravaganza that took two days to assemble – and included a custom white fur skirt underneath.

Advantages to hiring someone to decorate the landscape outside your dwelling or the inside – besides having no light strings to untangle – are many.

Hiring someone means not having to put up and take down the décor. For instance, trees come on wheels and can be rolled in to a home or business fully decorated. It also means that décor can change every year. There’s also the storage factor: “Light Up Naples” stores the décor so you don’t have to. And if you’re unsure of what colors or design you want, O’Flinn and Gardner are happy to figure that out, depending on the space you have to decorate, your budget and what the décor is for. Will you be having a party or is this just for a family celebration?

Since all of their trees are artificial, there’s not the fire hazard of a real tree. Real trees are not allowed in commercial buildings in Florida anyway, Gardner said. Timers turn the lights on and off. “It’s supposed to be just like magic,” O’Flinn said.

Light Up Naples started its first year decorating 10 homes and has worked its way up to more than 120 projects last year, its fifth Christmas. A seasonal crew of about 10 provides the installation.

The company doesn’t limit itself to homes, communities and Christmas trees.

A highlight this holiday season is guaranteed to be last year’s winner in the Naples Christmas Boat Parade. Light Up Naples is working on a custom light show synced to music, with life-sized characters on the 73-foot yacht. It will be adorned with 8,000 individually controlled pixel lights.

And it’s not too early to dream of December holidays. Dreaming of a white – or any color – Christmas in warm weather harkens back to the popular song’s potential origins. Although accounts vary as to when and where Irving Berlin wrote “White Christmas,” one story is that he wrote it in 1940, in warm La Quinta, California, while staying at the La Quinta Hotel, a frequent Hollywood retreat also favored by writer-director-producer Frank Capra, although the Arizona Biltmore also claims the song was written there.

Regardless, it warms hearts any time of year. And so does Light Up Naples. Call Light Up Naples at 239-228-8700.

Read the Spotlight News Magazine at swspotlight.com.