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Giant lanterns light up Christmas in Catholic Philippines
The festival features lanterns with 12,000 bulbs and 15 km of cables, supporting local craftsmen and preserving a 100-year tradition of festive religious displays.
- Held mid-December each year, this year's San Fernando Giant Lantern Festival showcased hand-crafted competition lanterns with religious and festive imagery.
- A craft rooted in colonial-era processions, the region's lantern industry began more than 100 years ago and families like Karl Quiwa's, a sixth-generation descendant, continue the Christmas tradition.
- The lanterns rely on large technical rigs and crews using 12,000 50-watt bulbs, 15 kilometres of electric cables, and rotors turned by teams of 20 over three months, with some lanterns weighing a tonne and costing a million pesos , while firefighters patrolled for sparks.
- Festival organisers say the event supports local sales and jobs, with companies selling thousands of lanterns annually to the Philippine overseas worker community, while Rodel Hipolito says lanterns symbolise light and joy across the archipelago nation of 116 million.
- Organisers warn that technology and apathy threaten the craft, with Florante Parilla saying, `Almost all the lantern-makers here are related to each other or are friends with the others`, and only one other entrant was as young as Karl Quiwa this year.
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Leaning Left6Leaning Right4Center10Last UpdatedBias Distribution50% Center
Bias Distribution
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50% Center
L 30%
C 50%
R 20%
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