This year’s Christmas will be the last holiday that President Joe Biden and his wife Jill Biden spend at the White House. Jill Biden will use some extraordinary designs to decorate the White House, giving this season a theme of “Peace and Light”.
The centerpiece of the holiday decorations is a towering Christmas tree surrounded by a carousel, brass bells, and sleighs. The decorations in the corridors and ceilings use designs that mimic falling snow.
On Monday, before First Lady officially unveiled the decorations later that evening, the White House held a preview specifically for media reporters and announced the holiday theme as “A Season of Peace and Light”.
In a holiday commemorative booklet soon to be distributed to all visitors, the Bidens wrote, “As we celebrate our final holiday in the White House, we are mindful of the values we hold sacred: faith, family, service to country, neighborliness, engaging communities, and adding vitality to them.”
The White House expects around 100,000 visitors this month.
Last week, over 300 volunteers decorated various public spaces in the White House with nearly 10,000 feet (3,048 meters) of ribbon, over 28,000 ornaments, more than 2,200 paper doves, and 165,000 garlands and wreaths, including various shaped ornaments, adorning 83 Christmas trees.
The White House’s themed Christmas tree is a towering Fraser Fir from North Carolina. After chandeliers were removed, it was secured under the ceiling of the Blue Room, located in the center of a colorful amusement park-style carousel where reindeer, swans, and other animals sway up and down on poles. The Christmas tree is adorned with sparkling multicolor lights and three-dimensional holiday candies such as peppermints and ribbon candies. The tree is also decorated with the names of the states, territories, and the District of Columbia.
Guests will enter the White House under rotating starlight and soon come across the Gold Star Tree, specifically dedicated to honoring fallen military members and their families, consisting of six gold stars representing the six branches of the military, one stacked on top of the other.
Bells on the East Colonnade corridor accompany festive laughter and joy. The ceiling and windows of the East Room are adorned with reflective decorations, creating an atmosphere of falling snowflakes. On the bases of the two large Christmas trees on each side of the central door in the room are silhouettes of people holding hands.
The Green Room’s colored glass decorations and prisms emit light, while the Red Room’s paper doves convey a message of peace. Doves are also suspended above the Cross Hall that connects the East Room and the State Dining Room.
In the State Dining Room, above a huge White House-shaped gingerbread, twinkling star-shaped patterns made of sugar illuminate. The White House display also includes a snowy South Grounds adorned with several twinkling mini Christmas trees, and there is an ice skating rink on the South Lawn where people are skating.
This sugar pastry display is for show only and cannot be eaten. It consists of 25 sheets of gingerbread dough, 10 sheets of sugar cookie dough, 65 pounds (29.48 kilograms) of icing, syrup, 45 pounds (20.41 kilograms) of chocolate, 50 pounds (22.68 kilograms) of icing sugar, and 10 pounds (4.54 kilograms) of glue.
As part of the White House’s Joining Forces display initiative, the First Lady will also invite National Guard families as the first group of the public to come and appreciate and experience the holiday decorations. The Bidens’ late son Beau served in the Delaware National Guard and passed away in 2015 due to brain cancer.
President Biden will leave office on January 20th.