Light Up the Palms and Telephone Poles

Christmas tree lights are everywhere. Schoolchildren sing “O Tannenbaum,” loosely translated as “O Christmas Tree.”

Los Angeles is lit up too. With Christmas Trunks.

In Beverly Hills, the trunks of the tall palms are wrapped in white lights on both sides of Wilshire Boulevard. In Santa Monica, streets around the Promenade are lined with Christmas Trunks, either all white or red and white. On bank plazas, in front of big hotels and high-rise condos, more Christmas Trunks. Even on streets where the trees have multiple trunks, even where trees have festoonable crowns, only the trunk, or trunks, are lit.

When did this start?

We must go deep into Los Angeles history -- about five years ago. The Ur-Trunks were probably the tall palms that define the L.A. landscape.

Unlike the traditional fir tree, palms are difficult to decorate because the leafy part of the tree is unreachable with a standard cherry picker. So you do the best you can down lower. Hence, the original Christmas Trunk.

Christmas Trunks have many advantages. It’s safer for municipal crews to work the lower levels on any large tree, not just a palm. It’s also cost-effective. You can wrap a whole lot of trunks in the time it would take to string lights on a full canopy.

When a tree isn’t available, concrete columns, obelisks, vertical outdoor artwork or even light poles will do. When the look is trunks, any columnar body will serve.

The custom has already spread to private spaces. On a drive through virtually any residential L.A. neighborhood, one can see brightly lit trunks on many front lawns. Not only is it easier: It’s tradition.

If trunks come to define Christmas, there would be no need for trees at all. We could become a seasonal fairyland of shining, shimmering telephone poles, traffic lights, stop signs, or, if it comes down to that, actual stumps.

The future is bright, O Tannenstumpf....