Lights in the Heights is an annual holiday celebration sponsored by the Woodland Heights Civic Association. This event is typically held on the second Saturday evening in December from 6 to 9pm. The host neighborhood, Woodland Heights, was developed during the first two decades of the twentieth century and is one of Houston’s designated historic districts. The neighborhood’s beautiful and quiet streets, covered in a canopy of mature live oak trees and lined with a plethora of restored craftsman-style bungalows, seem more fit for a small town than a dense urban neighborhood bounded by two major freeways and less than two miles from the city’s modern downtown district. Woodland Heights is also adjacent to Houston’s more famous Houston Heights, the city’s earliest suburb and home to many restored Victorian mansions and a shopping district well-known for its antiques stores and eclectic art galleries.
The festival features 14 blocks of two parallel neighborhood streets closed to all motor vehicles. The streets are lined with luminaries, and the majority of the houses are decorated with garlands, wreaths, and thousands, if not millions, of Christmas lights. Many houses also feature live entertainment, ranging from handbell choirs (I play in handbell choirs at two different churches that both perform at the same house for LIH each year) to small brass-and-string ensembles to vocalists. Other homes greet visitors with tables set up on their lawns offering complimentary hot chocolate, hot apple cider, cookies, and other treats. And for the kids, Santa usually makes an appearance early in the evening by riding through the neighborhood to the Norhill Street esplanade, where he’s available to meet children the rest of the night. Additionally, horse-drawn carriage rides are usually available.
The streets for Lights in the Heights vary from year to year, so that the same homeowners do not participate every year. Generally, the streets alternate between Highland and Bayland, Bayland and Woodland, and Woodland and Euclid. A map on the Lights in the Heights website details the streets for the event each year. Visitors to the event are advised to arrive fairly early, as traffic in the area can be intense during the festival. Because streets near the event are closed to vehicle traffic, parking is limited to residential streets a few blocks away from the festival streets and the parking lots of several neighborhood schools, churches, and parks. My advice is to plan on arriving in the neighborhood by 6pm. This will give you plenty of time to park, walk to the festival, see all the decorated houses on both streets, and enjoy some of the excellent musical entertainment without having to rush. And, because the event changes from year to year, I suggest visiting the Woodland Heights Civic Association website when planning your visit for the most current information.
If your visit to Houston overlaps with the weekend of this event, I can’t recommend it enough. It’s truly unique, free, and great fun for all ages.