During the festive season, European towns pull out all the stops with their Christmas lights. They install garlands and imaginative light decorations on market squares, downtown boulevards and in pedestrian zones. And they light up churches and historic buildings with hundreds of bulbs.

City officials and shop owners hope that these colorful decorations will attract tourists and additional customers. And since that benefits both local business and the community, there is a trend to put these lights up earlier every year.

This year, many towns installed their Christmas decorations long before the time of advent officially began on December 2nd. In many places, Christmas lights had already been up since early November.

Specialists from the Czech Republic

Many city officials from all over Europe turn to a company in the Czech Republic when they're planning to buy new Christmas decorations for their town. Milan Maur's company in Plzeň has specialized on designing large-scale Christmas light decorations.

Milan Maur sees himself as an artist. Since the beginning of the 1970s, his special interest has been the use of light in the visual arts.

Eventually, this brought him to designing Christmas light decorations. And since Milan is not only an artist but also a businessman, he understood that there was a market for his products all over Europe.

Today, Milan employs a whole team of graphic artists, architects and technicians who specialize in Christmas decorations. He even has a team of electricians that will travel to customers all over Europe to install the decorations.