The gifting trees
The Santa Ynez Valley Botanic Garden will host its Holiday Lights Festival on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, between Dec. 5 and 21 from 5 to 8:30 p.m. For tickets and more info on the event, visit syvholidaylights.com. The garden is located at 151 Sycamore Drive, Buellton.
Gray pines. Blue oaks. Warm and cool whites alike.
Bedazzled with twinkling lights for a limited time, dozens of trees at the Santa Ynez Valley Botanic Garden will illuminate the site during its signature winter tradition.
This year’s Holiday Lights Festival at the open-air locale is set to begin on Dec. 5 and run through Dec. 21.
Eva Powers, one of the event’s co-organizers whose volunteer experience at the garden stretches back to its first plantings in 2006, described the annual festival as appealing to all ages.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re a little one or have been here on the planet for a number of years, everybody has just a fabulous time,” Powers told the Sun. “And I think that is what’s giving back to us as volunteers. This is a large number of hours we’re putting into this, and to see those happy smiles on the faces we see, it’s just so wonderful.”
While the botanic garden is open to the public 365 days a year from sunrise to sunset, the Holiday Lights Festival grants visitors a rare perspective of the destination after dark—albeit enveloped in multicolored light displays that were intricately tailored to match different parts of the 4-acre site.
“When you walk along all of our pathways, you experience a new design and a new experience with each section throughout the garden,” said Powers, whose personal favorite motifs this year include thre winter wonderland and mushroom trail.
“There’s a 13-foot reindeer that families just can’t pass up,” she said with a laugh, while referring to one of the festival’s most photogenic light installations.
This December’s festival marks the Santa Ynez Valley Botanic Garden’s fourth season hosting the fundraiser.
“We appreciate every ticket that is sold because a lot of money will go toward the garden,” said Powers, a past president and longtime board member of the garden’s nonprofit. “Any proceeds after expenses will go toward benefiting the garden.”
While the city of Buellton owns the garden, the nonprofit manages and maintains it. Throughout the year, the group uses monetary support from grants, sponsorships, memberships, and donations, Powers said.
Despite some heavy rain Buellton encountered during the garden’s first Holiday Lights Festival in 2022, Powers has nothing but fond memories.
“The first year we got slammed with rain, but we still came out ahead, which was great,” Powers recalled. “It was a bit of a zoo. And we thought, ‘Oh gosh, nobody’s going to show up.’ But so many people showed up, and they had colorful umbrellas. And all the illuminated lights just glimmered so much more because of the rain.”
Over the years, Powers observed a trend among attendees who like to go all out for the occasion, which makes the fest great for people watching.
“I’d say every night is ugly sweater night,” she said with a laugh. Some visitors wear strings of holiday lights across their attire as well, she added.
Apart from wandering around the decorative grounds during the festival, guests can look forward to enjoying seasonal food and drink stations (offering mulled wine and cocktails, along with s’mores and other family-friendly fare), visits with Santa Claus and other characters, live music, and a snow machine.
“It’s soft snow, so the snowballs don’t hurt,” Powers said. There’ll even be a designated area to engage in some friendly snowball tossing, she added.
Born and raised in Sweden, Powers said that incorporating snow into the mix reminded her of her upbringing. She’s lived in Buellton since 1988.
Her career in landscape design led her to cross paths with some of her peers who helped bring the Santa Ynez Valley Botanic Garden to life in 2006.
Recalling the first trees she and other volunteers planted at the site, Powers said she remembers “looking at all these little sticks, and thinking, ‘Oh Lord, am I ever going to see that one grow up?’”
Those same trees at the garden are between 60 and 80 feet tall today, Powers said.
“It feels emotional to have been there, … and see it develop and grow, and now have my grandchildren play under those trees,” she said. “I also remember who were there to plant them. And some of those kids are now adults with their own kids, who come and visit the same garden, and point out those trees, and say, ‘I was your height when I planted that tree, and look at it now.’”
Reach Senior Staff Writer Caleb Wiseblood at cwiseblood@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Nov 20 – Nov 27, 2025.