Arts & Entertainment
Chicago’s Christmas Tree Is a 6-Ton, 66-Foot Beauty Set To Light Up Millennium Park This Holiday Season
This 66-foot Norway spruce will stand tall in Millennium Park as Chicago’s official 2025 Christmas tree. (Patty Wetli / WTTW News)
When it comes to choosing Chicago’s official Christmas tree, the stakes are high.
“This tradition has gone on for 112 years, so no pressure to find a great tree, right?” joked Neal Heitz, director of event production for the Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events.
The top criteria are: A. Is it tall? and B. Is it beautiful?
This year, Heitz is confident the team picked a beaut that checks all the right boxes: a 6-ton Norway spruce donated by the Mason family from suburban Glenview. City officials said the tree was 68 feet tall; the team cutting it down said the tree came in at 66 feet on the truck.
“As soon as we saw this tree, we knew,” said Heitz. “This tree is slightly larger than most applicant trees that we have gotten in the last few years, so this was a real gem to be found here in Glenview.”
On Monday morning, BrightView Landscape pulled up to the Mason house, situated on a leafy cul-de-sac, with a crane and flat-bed tractor-trailer. A four-man crew had already prepped the tree for removal last week, tying up all the branches to make it easier to transport.
Juan Carlos Alvarado, a BrightView veteran, stood at the ready with his chainsaw. When the signal was given, he expertly sliced the tree from its base as a small group of neighbors joined the Masons to say good-bye.
“It’s emotional,” Ryan Mason said. “I think once it finally leaves, it’s going to definitely feel a lot emptier.”
The Mason family donated the Norway spruce. Clockwise from top left: Ryan, Jody, Lucas and Evelyn. “I’m definitely going to tell my friends. I’ve been waiting a week to tell them,” said 11-year-old Evelyn. (Patty Wetli / WTTW News)
The Masons — dad Ryan, mom Jody, 11-year-old Evelyn and 8-year-old Lucas — have lived in the house for about 10 years and inherited the tree, which they were told dates back to the 1980s.
“It’s sort of a thing of legend in the neighborhood because it’s so huge,” Jody Mason said.
But it had reached the point where it needed to come down, she said, so they decided to submit it for consideration as Chicago’s Christmas tree.
It was a thrill to be chosen, she said, and the family is looking forward to taking part in the tree lighting festivities in Chicago on Nov. 21.
They had, over the years, attempted to decorate the tree themselves but because of its massive size, the most they managed was to wrap the trunk in several strands of lights, Jody Mason added.
First the tree is headed to BrightView’s Long Grove facility. There it will be pruned and shaped, a job made easier by Norway spruce’s flexibility, according to Jim Williams, senior account manager at BrightView.
A purpose-built steel tree base is already in position at Millennium Park, just waiting for the tree’s delivery on Wednesday.
The Masons made sure to grab several “souvenirs” in the form of pinecones before the truck pulled away.
It so happens that Jody Mason’s dad, who owns 25 acres of land in Indiana, has turned his property into something of a personal tree farm.
“Now we will have a few Norway spruces to add to the mix,” she said. "We’re going to germinate the seeds and replant some of the tree so it can live on.”
Contact Patty Wetli: [email protected]
