Yuanshan Flower Expo Park Lantern Festival
A 3D Horse lantern
the 2015 Taipei Lantern Festival at Taipei Expo Park was one of the places that R and I visited during Valentine’s Day weekend this year. The last time we saw such lanterns was back in 2012 when we went to the Lukang Lantern Festival with Tiger girl.
The lanterns on display in Taiwan were certainly very different from the ones that we see around Chinatown during Chinese New Year or the mid autumn festival. These lanterns are made by students and are all entries in the best lantern competition.
One of the exhibits on display.
Children as young as elementary school students are encouraged to take part in this competition. As you can see from the picture above this was one of the entries done by a group of elementary school students with the guidance of their teachers.
An under the sea exhibit
Each lantern was built based on a theme as you can see the one above was filled with different sea creatures. Don’t they look cute?
Sheep lanterns
There were many lanterns which were created to look like sheep as 2015 is the Year of the sheep.
Another sheep display
Three sheep with auspicious blessings.
Sheeps besides a model of the iconic Taipei 101
A huge cuddly sheep
I like this one the most as it looked like one which I wanted for myself. If only it came in a soft toy version. I certainly would purchase one for myself 🙂
A Dog Train lantern.
Besides sheep there were lanterns based on various cartoon characters like this Dog head train.
Roller coaster lantern
Some lanterns were built to resembled part of an amusement park like this roller coaster shown here.
A carousal lantern
Circus exhibit lanterns
Even the circus clowns were represented among the different lanterns which were on display in the park.
A pumpkin carriage
Fairy tales and Folk tales were the featured themes for some of the lanterns. I saw Cinderella’s carriage on display while walking through the park.
Lanterns based on folk tale.
I can’t remember off hand which story these characters were depicting but it was certainly nice to see them in traditional costumes.