Lantern Light Festival to light up Shakopee

Shakopee Valley News

There are not many places that have a 400-foot dragon lantern.

Shakopee is one of those places. 

After successful shows in Memphis and Miami, the Lantern Light Festival will be at Canterbury Park from Sept. 7 to Oct. 22.

"The pictures don't do the event justice," Pinnacle Production Group President and CEO Sanjay Syal said. "When you stand next to this dragon, there's no picture that makes that kind of impact. I think the biggest thing is what's here is totally different from what's on video."

Designs for the lanterns are first sketched and then steel rods are shaped to create the frames. The frames are filled with LED lights and then covered with silk-like fabric. Each lantern theme takes about four weeks to complete with hundreds of lanterns appearing at the festival.

"People really appreciate this more if they see how it's built," Syal said. "When you truly appreciate what it takes to build it, then you understand how beautiful this looks."

Over 30 lantern artists came to Shakopee from Zigong, China, in August to work on the festival but work has been going on  all summer.

Finding a long-term location and willing venue operator was essential to choosing Shakopee to host the next show.

"The most important thing is being able to find land that you can occupy for such a long time," Syal said. "This is a very expensive production — most of these will be between $1.6 to $2 million to produce by the time it's all said and done, just because of the manpower it takes and the labor it takes to build this."

The location was also ideal due to the growth of the Twin Cities and drawing people from Mankato and Rochester, Syal said.

"Shakopee and the southern part of the Twin Cities has done very well in their growth," he said. "It's growing pretty rapidly."

As with other host cities for the festival, the show will feature several Minnesota-themed lanterns including Paul Bunyan and Prince tribute lanterns.

Syal recommends coming about a half hour to an hour before sunset to see the lanterns before they are lit up and then after to see the work and detail that goes into the production.

Over 2,000 years ago, Chinese Emperor Hanmingdi ordered lanterns to be lit for Buddha on the fifteenth day of the first Chinese lunar month, according to a news release.

Besides the lanterns, the event will also feature inflatable mazes, obstacle courses, dragon rides, mining for emeralds, music, wishing tree, Chinese acrobats and more. Tickets are from $18 to $23, with group pricing available.

For more information and to purchase tickets, go to www.lanternlightfestival.com.