Winter Lights at Canary Wharf

Last evening I headed off to Canary Wharf with my husband to enjoy the annual Winter Lights Festival. I had downloaded the map earlier in the week and had intended to go on Tuesday night, but that turned out to be the coldest night with rain and snow, so I abandoned the idea. Last night was the warmest night of the week and we re-scheduled. We were not to be disappointed.

Canary Wharf is a place I always get lost in, but I do believe I'm at last getting to know it! We have a love/hate relationship. I've always gone on a day when it's either cloudy and cold or windy, sunny and cold. I've been there to see the public art and to visit the roof garden at Crossrail Place, and crossed the dock to go to the Docklands Museum. Last night with the lights twinkling from the skyscraper offices and reflecting on the water, it kind of looked pretty. It was very busy, the pubs were buzzing with workers enjoying the end of the working week, and all around were people like us armed with maps following the trail of the marked winter lights displays. And if you got lost, or needed to know where to find the next location, there were plenty of people around to ask who were distributing maps.

For a little bit of background information on Canary Wharf I'll tell you that it is estimated that around 2,500 bombs were dropped on the docks during World War Two. While some re-building took place and docks operated by the 1980's the major docks were closed. Later the government set up the Docklands Development Corporation, but the selling of land had developers building housing for people with money, and it is dominated with expensive apartments. However, businesses moved in and it is a major banking area.

Canary Wharf is one of those places I wrote about before - a privately owned public space - or 'Pops' for short, and is not subject to ordinary local authority bylaws but rather governed by restrictions drawn up by the landowner. They have their own security force. The other Pops I know of are the Kings Cross development (which I visited recently) and The Barbican.

If you would like to know more about the history of Docklands and Canary Wharf click here.

Going back to the winter lights, there were 21 exhibits and we worked our way through them in order (though we did miss the ice rink, though I saw this last year - it has a 'lightbench' - when I visited one afternoon not realising there was a light show!).

We began at Jubilee Plaza and wandered along Mackenzie Walk to Cabot Square and to Westferry Circus where the trees dominate. They looked very Christmasy. We came back along the North Dock and Crossrail Place and up to the Roof Garden (where we ate our sandwiches!). Then it was back to Jubilee Park for the last part. Some exhibits had sound - the best was Whale Ghost at Cubitt Steps. The fountain at Cabot Square had music. One of the busiest and quite spectacular was Submergence in Montgomery Square. Up in the Roof Garden people were queuing to sit on the Vena Lumen (bench) to have their photo taken. I took quite a few videos as a photo didn't do some of the exhibits justice. Here are some of the photos I took. It was a great evening, and thankfully not too cold.