Christmas in Clinton to Resume in 2021
It’s home for the holidays: Christmas in Clinton will return this year after it was canceled in 2020. While officials are still ironing out the details, they say to keep Sunday, Dec. 5 marked in the calendar for the event.
Christmas in Clinton has been a staple of Clinton’s holiday season for almost two decades. Organized by the Clinton Chamber of Commerce, the event sees Clinton’s downtown transformed into a winter wonderland.
Held on the first Sunday each December, Christmas in Clinton draws big crowds of all ages to the downtown to visit attractions like Santa’s workshop, the Soup’s On contest, the Elf on a Shelf scavenger hunt, and other civic themed booths. The event always culminates with a tree lighting and appearance by Santa at the Town Hall.
Paul Orsini, the chamber’s executive director, confirmed to the Harbor News that the event will be returning in 2021.
“It’s exciting, a lot of people have been asking for it,” Orsini said.
While the event is confirmed a go with the date and time—1 to 5 p.m.—set, Orsini said that there is still much to iron out.
“We’re in the stages of planning the final details,” he said.
Orsini said that the tree lighting and Christmas carols will be held, but the rest of the day is still up in the air. Orsini said he expects to have the final details of the day planned in early November.
“It’s partly a matter of going to the different stores and asking if they still want to participate,” said Orsini.
The Dec. 5 event will mark a welcome return for the event that was sadly canceled in 2020 due to COVID-19. Initially, town leaders had been optimistic that the event would still have been held in 2020, but as cases steadily climbed, that became less feasible. By early November, Clinton’s COVID level had reached red status and red status towns were recommended to limit gatherings to only those in one’s family and canceling public events.
Orsini said that bringing the event back will be a chance to return some “normalcy” to the town and be a welcome sight to many.
“Knock on wood, but the COVID numbers for Connecticut look good now so I think we’ll be good to go,” said Orsini.