The festival of lights is intimately related at the city’s religious history.

The city of Lyon strongly venerates the Blessed Virgin since Middle Age and is under her protection since 1643, that year when plague devastated all south of France especially Lyon. From that time, the people of Lyon decided to honour the Virgin each year, as the disease didn’t come back. In 1850 Lyon’s religious authority organized a contest, which consisted in the construction of a statue of the Virgin to install on the top the Basilique de Fourvière. The sculptor Fabisch won the contest and the inauguration was planned on the 8th of September 1852, the day of the Virgin’s Birth. However floods prevent the party and it was postponed to the 8th of December, the day of the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary.

From that period the 8th of December is an important celebration day in Lyon. The tradition is that people put candles at the windows and meat in the street to celebrate. Since more then 10 years now, the 8th of December is transformed into a spectacular light festival. Each year a new program of light animation of the sites and monuments is presented to the public during 3 or 4 days. Many paths around the city are possible. Here is an exhaustive list of the sceneries that must be seen:

- Place des Terreaux: “Lets play with the time and the weather”. An allegory of passing time and changing weather with the buildings covered with ice, submerged in water, and melt under the heat.

- Place Louis Pradel: “My public garden”. Place Louis-Pradel becomes a botanical garden with surprising plants made of light and metal...

- Place des Jacobins: “La Dolce Vitta”. Inspired by the famous scene from Fellini’s film at the Trevi Fountain in Rome, Dolce Vita plunges the Place des Jacobins and its fountain into the atmosphere of Italian cinema in the sixties.

- Place Bellecour: The Ferris wheel changes into a gigantic circular screen for the projection of the film Night at the Museum. It evokes an imaginary visit to the collections of the Lyon Museum of Fine Arts.




- St Jean Cathedral: “A tribute to the builders”.




- Basilique de Fourvière:



“Carillon and light paintings”. For the first time, the main façade of Notre-Dame de Fourvière is transformed by different light paintings that follow the music of the basilica’s exceptional 23-bell carillon.






- The metal tower: “The digital man “.Visible throughout the city.





The national day pyrotechnic show canceled on the 14th of because of bad weather conditions is programmed on the 6th of December at 7 pm.











To get more information on the 2009 light festival





To get further information, you can connect to the website of the French school Inflexyon and to the forum of the French courses.
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