The concert season at the Mann Center is done; so what’s all that light coming from West Fairmount Park in Philadelphia?
That’s “The Glow: A Jack O’Lantern Experience,” an all-ages, nighttime seasonal attraction running Thursdays through Sundays through Oct. 29, across from the Mann.
Starring more than 5,000 flickering, hand-carved jack o’lanterns, The Glow is also being enjoyed by Washington DC market audiences in Fairfax, Va., as well as in Nashville.
The Halloween spirit is certainly there, but it’s not intended to be scary, so it’s good for kids, said The Glow’s creator and producer, Debbi Katz. “You hear all about your haunted houses. What about an alternative to Halloween entertainment?,” she said.
While you’re waiting to get in – tickets are timed and you shouldn’t arrive earlier than 30 minutes before your scheduled slot – check out food trucks, live pumpkin carving demonstrations and interact with The Glow’s mascot, Jack the happy skeleton.
The 1/3 mile-long, lantern-lit trail is a medley of larger-than-life scenes composed of artistically detailed pumpkin carvings – a foggy graveyard with black cats, ghosts and gravestones; a Prehistoric Park of skeletal dinosaurs standing up to 16 feet tall; a band of pumpkin pirates aboard a 30-foot-long pirate ship; an undersea scene with sharks and jellyfish sculpted from multiple pumpkins; a whimsical carnival; a snowy winter scene populated by white pumpkin creations; a skeleton motorcycle gang with a driving rock music soundtrack; Philly-specific highlights and more.
According to Katz – whose event production company collaborates with Broadway directors and performers, lighting experts and set designers – when she polls exiting visitors what their favorite part was, “you get five different answers.” You’re encouraged to share your feedback at www.theglowjackolantern.com.
Katz and lead pumpkin carving artist Will Teran revealed that many of the jack o’lanterns are live fruit, but some are faux pumpkins, molded from real ones and then hand carved by the team of artists. Some of the pumpkin works of art can take as long as eight hours to complete. “It’s an obsession,” said Teran, who shared that the carved organic pumpkins have to periodically be switched out with fresh ones during the run of The Glow, and treated with bleach to prevent mold.
Figuring that you’ll be inspired by The Glow’s various vignettes, plenty of pumpkins in a variety of shapes and sizes are available for sale after you reach the end of the trail.
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