To celebrate the Lantern Festival, guests were invited to Dr Sun Yet-San Gardens to make lanterns and enjoy Tang-Yuan.
Envelopes from last year’s ‘Year of the Dragon’ were used to make lanterns. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
February 12 marks the last day of 2025’s Lunar New Year. The last day is celebrated through the Lantern Festival, where people around the world create lanterns and let them shine throughout the night. To celebrate, Dr Sun Yet-San Chinese Gardens invited guests to come and learn how to make lanterns out of leftover red envelopes.
Ivion Xie, a part time facilitator at the garden and one of the leaders of the event, said the Lantern Festival dates back over two thousand years ago to the Tang Dynasty. People would make colourful lanterns in different shapes like animals or flowers, and light them up with candles.
“We have no electricity back then, [and] the lights kind of light up the sky and also add up the atmosphere because the last day of the Chinese New Year celebration. The Lantern Festival, it signifies sort of the peak of the celebration as a with a great ending,” Xie said, adding the festival was especially exciting for women at the time, who were not permitted to be out at night otherwise.
Another tradition present at the event, was a serving of Yuan-tuang soup. Xie said the round rice dumplings represent the moon being in its last lunar phase.
“It symbolizes the round shape, and also the moon shape,” she says, “…eating something in a round shape, it means that everybody get together.”
Xie explained how there’s a stronger tie to Taoism through circular symbols, like Yin and Yang, where there is a white half and a black half of a circle.
“Like the whole thing (Yin and Yang) is a round shape, and everything in the nature can be included in that, and applies to people as well, like us.”
At the gardens, Xie led a group of guests through different steps on how to make lanterns to celebrate the last day of Lunar New Year. Take a look at the pictures below to see the different designs, and steps they took to create them.
Xie said It’s traditional to give your family members red envelopes filled with money during Lunar New Year. It’s common for leftover envelopes to be used for decorations at home, as to not waste the materials. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Guests made many small folds as they began to make their lanterns. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Many more people attended the event this year than last, said Xie. They filled all the available table space. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Xie led the group through different steps in order to make their lanterns. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Guests could choose from three different lanterns to make. Completed ones were shown for reference. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Once guests completed their lanterns, they could add lights so they could shine through the night. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
A guest examines their final product, adding lights to the outside. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Many of the attendees examined finished lanterns for reference as they crafted their own. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
In order to make the lanterns, guests needed to fold each individual envelope and then tape or staple them together in the correct shapes. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)
Tang-Yuan was also served at the event. This is a common Southern China style of dumpling eaten during the new year. (Isabella Calissi / BCIT News)