Christmas lights: Dazzling Dundee through the decades

Christmas lights across Courier Country are bursting into life to bring some sparkle and cheer to dark winter days.

Already, Dundee’s city centre is a blaze of colour with the lights switched on last month and the Christmas tree twinkling brightly in City Square.

We’ve dug deep into our archives to take a look at the city’s Christmas celebrations and decorations through the decades. Enjoy!

1. Our first image, from 1986, shows shoppers on the High Street and in City Square beneath Christmas lights and decorations. 

2. The second photo, from 1965, shows some of the city’s Christmas lights along Murraygate.  

3. In the third photo, from 1984, crowds gather to watch the big switch-on of the Christmas tree lights in City Square.

4. Four-year-old Kieran Taylor from Dryburgh looked suitably festive while waiting for the Christmas lights switch-on in City Square in 1999. 

5. Someone pulled out all the stops to create this eye-catching Christmas display outside a house on Muirfield Road in 1998.

6. Santa Claus took his “reindeer” and sleigh to meet children in City Square. This jolly photograph was used in the city council’s 1989 Christmas card. 

7. It was most definitely a white Christmas in 1961 as this snowy photo of the city’s High Street shows. 

8. Stunning lights and decorations along Murraygate in 1963.

9. Beep beep! Back in 1979, a Dundee Corporation Bus brought smiles to passengers and everyone it passed when it was decorated from wheel to roof!

10. Youngsters sang carols as Lochee’s Christmas tree and lights were switched on in 1979. 

11. Dundee’s 1960 Christmas tree in City Square with a couple walking together arm-in-arm in the foreground.