Lighting up for Christmas again!
FAMILY’S SPECTACULAR DISPLAY HELPS CHARITIES – DESPITE COVID
THE man behind the renowned spectacular Christmas lights display in Nuthall has spoken of his pride over raising money for two charities.
Tony Swift, 62, a court official who lives on Laurel Crescent, and his family transform their home and garden into a Christmas extravaganza every year. So far they have raised £188,000 for Hayward House hospice at Nottingham City Hospital and When You Wish Upon a Star, a charity that grants wishes to children with lifethreatening illnesses.
And Tony says it’s a special feeling raising money and seeing it make a difference.
He said: “When you see the kids going to Lapland at the beginning of December, it’s pride to say that you helped to raise the money for some of those children to go, along with their mum, dad or carer.
“It is popular, as when the regulars see us putting the lights up, they feel it’s getting near to Christmas.
“Normally, we get somewhere between 30,000 and 35,000 visitors in the six-week period they’re up, but with Covid about, we’ve kept it small and private but people can come and take photos if they want to.
“We’ve been running now for just under two weeks and on the opening night, even though we’ve not published it as a main event, we still got around 150, 200 people turn up.”
The family started raising money from their displays in 2003 after just doing the lights for themselves for the first few years.
That year Tony’s father-in-law – a man he describes as his “best mate” – died of cancer after being a day patient at Hayward House hospice.
He said: “The first year, we raised £197, and we doubled it, and every year after that, it just got bigger and bigger.
“We moved to where we are at the moment in Nuthall in 2007 and, in the first year here, we raised £790.
“Both charities rely solely on donations, and the more we can raise for them, the better it is.”
The first display – in 2000 – attracted a small crowd of 22. By 2019, the audience had grown to 20,000.
But 2020’s event was scaled back because of Covid. While this year’s display – which runs until January 1 – is bigger than last year’s, it’s still not as big as previous displays, so that long queues can be avoided.
Tony had Covid in November last year and says it knocked him off his feet for ten weeks, leaving him with long Covid.
He said: “Last year, we were in a lockdown where you couldn’t have people in the garden, and we were worried if we open it up, and had Santa’s grotto and a long queue, then we would be breaking the law. Each person would have been fined around £200 and we would have been fined £10,000.
“And as we saw, fines were given out for that amount, so we decided to do a small display, which went down well and we still raised £5,600.
“This year, we’ve still kept it to the size where people cannot come in the garden, unless they come and knock on the door with a note or something like that, but we’ve kept it that way for safety reasons.”