MILWAUKEE COUNTY

China Lights lantern festival returning to Milwaukee County's Boerner Botanical Gardens

Jordyn Noennig
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

After an extended stay that drew more than 100,000 visitors last year, a revamped  "China Lights: The Magic Returns" is coming to Boerner Botanical Gardens with an almost entirely new light show, according to a Milwaukee County Parks news release. 

This is the second year that the festival will come to the garden at 9400 W. Boerner Drive, Hales Corners, with 95% of the show new and the two most popular displays returning. 

People walk under a series of illuminated arches at the monkey gallery to enter the China Lights display last year at Boerner Botanical Gardens.

The 2017 festival will run Sept. 22 through Oct. 22, featuring nearly 50 handmade giant lantern displays, two stages for Chinese folk-culture activities and two dining areas with Asian and Western food vendors. 

Artisans from the Chinese town Zigong City will arrive in Milwaukee in August to begin work on the show's more than 1,000 components, which include creating lanterns ranging from 3 feet to three stories high. 

RELATED:China Lights display brightens Boerner Botanical Gardens

The show is put on by Tri City National Bank and is being aided by a $30,000 advertising grant from the Wisconsin Department of Tourism and Travel Wisconsin. 

“Boerner Botanical Gardens has been the best venue in North America to view this show,” Kristen Talbott, senior vice president of Tri City National Bank, said in the news release. “The garden spaces and displays are flawlessly integrated. We are so pleased to be presenting this amazing experience.”

In 2016, Milwaukee became the first Midwestern city to schedule the China Lights show, which sold out and attracted more than 100,000 visitors. 

The lights show is put on as a part of a Chinese campaign with the goal of holding 100 lantern shows in 100 cities to spread Chinese culture and promote cultural exchange worldwide. Lantern lighting has been a custom for thousands of years in China, and Zigong City now boasts 38 lantern-making companies with 80,000 lantern artisans.