Yuyuan Garden Lantern Fair to light up Shanghai on New Year's Day

The 2025 Yuyuan Garden Lantern Fair will kick off on Jan. 1 to mark the upcoming Year of the Snake.

Photo shows the Ninghui Road lantern installation of the 2025 Yuyuan Garden Lantern Fair, which will light up Shanghai on Jan. 1, 2025. (Photo courtesy of the organizer of the fair)

The 42-day event lasting till Feb. 12 at Yuyuan Garden, a popular tourist destination in Shanghai, features a diverse collection of lanterns highlighting the zodiac sign of the snake.

The 2025 event is inspired by the ancient literature "Shan Hai Jing," or "Classic of Mountains and Seas," just like the previous edition. Incorporating various elements of other animals, forests, and mountains, the lantern installations aim to present a vibrant and harmonious scene of diverse life forms.

The 2025 Yuyuan Garden Lantern Fair will light up Shanghai on Jan. 1, 2025. (Photo courtesy of the organizer of the fair)

The annual Yuyuan Garden Lantern Fair, which was listed as a national intangible cultural heritage, has become an iconic Chinese New Year celebration in China.

To mark the special occasion of the 30th anniversary of the fair, a special exhibition on Chinese lantern art, the first of its kind in Shanghai, will be held between Jan. 1 and Feb. 28 along with the fair. The exhibition will showcase 13 pieces of ancient lantern artifacts from museums.

A lantern installation same as the Ninghui Road version of the Yuyuan Garden Lantern Fair is illuminated on Fengjing Road on Dec. 8, 2024. (Photo courtesy of the organizer of the fair)