Holiday decorating is a tall order at Mall of America

November 8, 2013 at 3:00AM
Mall contractor Casey Kraft put together an oversized tree in the Rotunda at the Mall of America on Thursday, November 7, 2013 in Bloomington, Minn. ] RENEE JONES SCHNEIDER • reneejones@startribune.com
Mall contractors assembled one of two oversized trees on Thursday in the rotunda at the Mall of America. Each tree has 385 branches and holds 32,000 LED lights. (The Minnesota Star Tribune)

The Mall of America is decorating for the holidays, when about 120,000 visitors a day pass through its doors between Black Friday and New Year's. But decorating the 4.2-million-square-foot space is no small task, partly because the decorations themselves are huge.

There are:

• Two giant trees in the mall's rotunda. Each one is 44 feet tall and 22 feet in diameter, has 385 branches, and holds 32,000 LED lights and 60 strobe lights.

• 15 giant ball ornaments ranging from 5 to 8 feet in diameter and weighing 200 to 300 pounds.

• 50 miles of LED lights to be strung.

• 200 smaller artificial trees.

It takes:

• One month to decorate the mall for the holidays.

• Five workers more than an hour to hang each of the giant ball ornaments.

• 10 decorators, a construction firm and the mall's maintenance department to put up all the decorations.

What…:

• Is different this year : A new Santa display with a new color scheme that includes champagne, silver, blue and green.

• Does decorating the mall cost: Not disclosed.

• Is the timetable for planning next year's holiday decorations: Work began right after Halloween.

Steve Alexander

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