Major funding secured: Work Now Underway on Return of The Bay Lights

You know it’s big news when it’s in the New York Times!

Today, The New York Times broke our news: The Bay Lights project is a “Go.”

We’ve reached our $10M major gift goal, and the monumental artwork by artist Leo Villareal is officially starting – with a beautiful new twist that will include millions more people in the experience. 

You can read Heather Knight’s article here.

While you may want to hold off on making hotel and restaurant reservations to join the celebration, we anticipate installing the 50,000 new LEDs this fall if everything goes as planned. The artist will test and fine-tune the artwork throughout the winter, and the grand lighting will be held in early spring.

Meanwhile, with your help, we will continue chipping away at the final $1M of this $11M project. More than 1,200 Bay Lights lovers have donated to our crowdfunding campaign. We are halfway there, with just under $500,000 left to raise.

Join The Bay Lights’ constellation of supporters and help us close the final gap.

Illuminate directly reaches more than 20 million San Francisco residents and visitors annually, day and night. We never charge admission, and we accept no corporate sponsorship. Everything we create is free to experience. You will never see ads or logos on any Illuminate work.

We exist purely in the culture of generosity, bringing great groups of people together to make San Francisco, the City of Awe, ever more magical. We invite you to join Illuminate’s family of generous supporters at whatever level you can.