As we celebrate the Palace’s 150th anniversary in 2023, we’ve taken a quick look at a tradition of ours that goes all the way back to 1873: Ally Pally’s fireworks!
1878 Five years after the Palace opened, the fireworks were accompanied by the Palace Military Band, plus the intriguing ‘Aladdin’s Jewelled Trees’, ‘Swarms of Brilliant Snakes’ and the head-scratching ‘Mammoth Silver Fire Wheels with newly devised intersecting Centre, flanked on either side with Illuminated Danish Devices’.
1888 James Pain regularly provided fireworks at Alexandra Palace and built the spectacular Last Days of Pompeii, advertised here, a recreation of Vesuvius which would explode nightly on the boating lake. Also advertised is Professor Baldwin’s descent from Cloudland, a parachute jump from a balloon over the Park.
Mr Pain followed up his success of the Last Days of Pompeii with destruction of the Spanish Armada, also on the boating lake.
Fireworks were not just limited to November and would run throughout the year. This remained a popular fixture well into the twentieth century. The below article in the Hornsey Journal, Friday August 30 1974, features a Bank Holiday display that was watched by thousands.
This ticket, for the event in 1984, advertises the Alexandra Pavilion which was constructed in the grounds of the Palace following the fire which destroyed much of the building in 1980.
The Bier Festival, of course, continues to the present day and in recent times has included performances from the Spice Girls, Elvis, Elton John and Kylie (tribute bands, that is).
In 2020, during the covid-19 lockdowns, 25,000 people tuned in to watch an online re-showing of our epic 2019 display. It was a cracker.
And, in 2023, the ‘Glastonbury of Fireworks’ returns once again. Across two nights experience foot-stomping live music, a taste of Bavaria at the UK’s largest German Bier Festival, legendary DJ sets in the StrEATlife Village courtesy of Fat Tony and DJ Spoony. Enjoy mind-blowing lightning magic from Lords of Lightning, a whizz around the ice rink to a disco soundtrack and, of course, another legendary fireworks display lighting up the London skyline. See you there!
