BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Bethlehem’s Christmas City Village is getting a makeover.
The Downtown Bethlehem Association has changed the design of the village’s huts and increased the number of vendors.
- The huts at Bethlehem's Christmas City Village were redesigned this year to allow customers to shop inside them and vendors to leave their displays up all season long
- The Christmas City Village will also have more huts and more vendors this year
- The village will open on Nov. 10 and run until Dec. 23
The holiday-themed wooden huts on Main Street, filled with potential gift items, open Nov. 10 as part of a holiday tradition that draws thousands of people downtown.
DBA Manager Kelly Smith said the association decided to change the style of the huts because the previous huts were difficult for the vendors to use.
“It was very challenging for them every day to come in and load in and out and put their displays on the outside,” Smith said. “So we copied Boston, Baltimore and Philadelphia and some of the German-style Christmas villages around the world and decided to make the huts more user-friendly.”
“We are just so excited for these new huts. They're beautiful, they're spacious, they're well-made. And there's just no place like Christmas in Bethlehem. It's just magical.”Melissa Morales, owner of Melmo’s Dog Treats
The new huts, built by Pine Creek Structures, are bigger and more resilient to the weather, so the vendors will be able to set up a display inside and leave it there throughout the season.
Melissa Morales, owner of Melmo’s Dog Treats in Philadelphia, has sold her products in the village for four years. She said the old huts often were cold and didn’t have enough space to display everything, so the new design is a welcome improvement.
“We are just so excited for these new huts,” Morales said. “They're beautiful, they're spacious, they're well-made. And there's just no place like Christmas in Bethlehem. It's just magical.”
The village will have 20 vendors, 10 of which are new. The new vendors include Love Jerk Hut, selling jerk sauce; Christmas City Spirits, a local distillery; and Bethlehem Public Library, which will sell books.
DBA, Boyle Construction and D’Huy Engineering collaborated to help design the huts. Arif Fazil, president of D’Huy Engineering, said the group tried to create a design that matched the style of Bethlehem.
“Everybody felt like it just fit the mold of downtown and had a little bit of a Moravian feel to it,” Fazil said. “And I think that was the thought behind it. They're pretty simple. But, you know, some of the stuff that the Moravians had is simple.”
Smith said there will be 15 huts this year, up from 11 last year. Two of them will be in new locations: one in front of Tavern at the Sun Inn on the north end of Main Street and another in front of Clementine Salon on West Broad Street.
Some of the vendors will be at the village for only part of season.
The huts open on Nov. 10 and close on Dec. 24. They are open 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Thursday to Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. They are closed on Thanksgiving.
