The 2025 Illuminate Parade lit up Boston with mythical creations
On Friday 28 November, Transported and the people of Boston filled the town centre with colour and creativity as the annual Illuminate Parade wound through the streets ahead of the Christmas lights switch-on, forming a key part of Boston Borough Council’s Christmas Festival Weekend.
Illuminate is our Boston annual heritage-inspired winter parade, each year shining a spotlight on a different aspect of the town’s history. Previous themes have explored Boston’s Pilgrim roots and its transatlantic links to the founding of Boston, Massachusetts, offering a vibrant acknowledgment of the area’s international connections.
This year’s Illuminate 2025 continued that tradition with a new theme: Fantastic Beasts of Boston. Inspired by the remarkable medieval carvings—known as misericords—inside St Botolph’s Church, the designs for the lanterns began with community sketching workshops held in the church itself. These drawings informed lantern-making sessions led by Lincolnshire artist Ruth Pigott (Curiosity Creators), bringing together residents, schools, and community groups to create the illuminated artworks featured in the parade.
Our regular collaborators and participants may have realised that another of our projects, 1000 Faces, is also inspired by the carvings in the Stump’s choirstalls, but in this project it is the thumb-sized portraits of medieval Bostonians that we are reimagining.
Among the standout creations was a striking griffin lantern, crafted with students from Giles Academy in workshops led by artists Lou Jones, Emily Cartwright, and Nadya Monfrinoli. Based on participants’ studies of the misericords, the hybrid creature—part lion, part eagle—captured the mythical spirit at the heart of this year’s theme.
Despite a sudden heavy rain shower earlier in the day, threatening us with a very soggy lion, it soon brightened up and the evening brought a wonderful celebratory atmosphere. We were so impressed by the attendance, the streets were lined with spectators and we had an overwhelmingly positive response online – thank you so much everyone!
Local residents and participants to our workshops shared their enthusiasm and said:
“Thank you so much for giving me and others the opportunity to help make, create and participate in such an amazing event. I’m sure it was bigger and better than last year’s.”“My first time at the parade. I’ve only lived in Boston a short time and feel so welcomed. Wonderful place.”
Parade Order
- Lion – Large Lantern – Boston College
- Dragons – Josie Clarke Dance Academy
- Wings – Performer: Asher Williams
- Samba Band – Chris Lewis Jones
- Stags and Hunter – Community Dance Group (Costume & creation by Ruth Pigott / Beth Williams)
- Wolves – High School Dance Group – Boston High School & NACRO
- Large Stag Lantern – Crafty Coffee Club
- Swan Lanterns – Crafty Coffee Club & Eastern European Friends
- Community Lanterns – Eagles, angels, hares, birds and castles
- Misericord Faces – Box Lanterns – Boston High School
- Boston West – Dragons
- Wyberton – People
- St Thomas – Wolves
- Boston Pioneers – Bears
- Hawthorn Tree – Owls
- Fat Cat Brass – Band
- Fox and Chicken – Stilt Walker: Lauren Williams
- The White Queen – Stilt Walker: Laura Hudson
- Little Lanterns – CentrePoint Outreach
- Big Fish / Little Fish – Scott House
- Gargoyles – Endeavour School
- Griffin – Large Lantern – Giles Academy
- Donna’s Carnival Crew – Donna Fox Associates / Montserrat Masqueraders
Our assistant director, Dr Anna Scott, said:
“It was great to see so many smiling faces taking part in Transported’s parade on Friday, which featured some fantastic beasts of Boston as part of our theme. This year marked Transported’s 10th anniversary of Illuminate, which began in 2015 to launch the Mayflower 400 commemorations.
Our parade now showcases creative interpretations of Boston’s heritage stories—this year exploring the intriguing misericord carvings hidden in the Stump.
Thanks to our talented team of artists and performers, we reached over 400 people across more than 30 workshops leading up to the event, and we were delighted to see so many join us to parade with their creations—rain-free in the end!”
This year’s Illuminate Parade was made possible thanks to funding from Arts Council England via Transported and Story Tellers Lincs, the South & East Lincolnshire Council Partnership’s NPO. The event was delivered by Transported with our team of associate artists.