Winter Park's Busiest Holiday Night Is Dec. 4. Most of It Repeats.
November 5, 2026
November 5, 2026
Winter Park's holiday season starts on three straight days this year, all within a few blocks of Central Park. The Morse Museum lights its Tiffany windows on Thursday, December 3. The Chamber's street party fills Park Avenue on Friday, December 4. The parade comes down the same avenue on Saturday morning, December 5. Rollins College's Christmas Vespers and the Morse Museum's free Friday evening also both fall on that Friday.
Of the events on December 4, only Winter on the Avenue happens just once. The others repeat on other nights, and that makes the whole weekend easier to plan.
The 48th annual Christmas in the Park is free and starts at 6:15 p.m. on Thursday, December 3, when the signal goes out to switch on the window lights. The Bach Festival Society Choir and Brass Ensemble play holiday favorites, and the concert wraps up around 8 p.m. The windows stay lit until 8:30 p.m.
According to the Morse, seven century-old memorial windows will be shown. They are the Julia Henop, Katharine Hinman Hamlin, Ruth Seely Dunning, Sophia Catherine Minton, Almy Townsend Hicks, Anna B. Innes and Eliza M. Morgan windows. They go up in the northern section of Central Park, about a block from the museum, near the corner of Garfield and Park avenues.
Here's how seating works:
Thursday is the quietest of the three days, and it's the only night the windows are the main event. For anyone who has room in their schedule for just one evening on the north lawn, this is it.
These are the events on Friday, December 4, in the order they start:
Two of these four starting points can be moved. The Morse's free evenings with live music also run on November 27 and on December 11 and 18. The museum offers free admission every Friday from 4 to 8 p.m. from November through April. Rollins holds Christmas Vespers three nights in a row, on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, December 4 through 6, with the same schedule each night.
That leaves the street party as the only Friday event that happens just once. The tree lighting, the menorah lighting and Santa's 6:30 arrival are all on that night only. If a household wants all three on its calendar, the simplest plan is to give Friday to Central Park and put the museum and the chapel on other evenings.
The day after Thanksgiving is Friday, November 27, which is also the first of the Morse's holiday Friday nights. Families with relatives in town that week can go then and keep December 4 for Park Avenue.
Christmas Vespers is a Rollins tradition that dates to 1933, and it takes more advance planning than anything else that weekend. Tickets are $25, with alumni discounts, and seating inside Knowles Memorial Chapel is general admission. You can buy tickets online or by phone at (407) 646-2145 on weekdays between 1 and 5 p.m. Rollins students, faculty and staff get complimentary tickets by emailing [email protected].
Going on Saturday the 5th or Sunday the 6th means you won't be competing with Winter on the Avenue for an evening, or for parking. Rollins recommends the Truist Parking Garage off Park Avenue, between Comstock and Lyman avenues. Leave through the southeast corner of the garage, and a golf-cart shuttle runs from 5 p.m. and again right after the program. Accessible parking is in front of the Alfond Sports Center off Chase Avenue, and a ramp leads to a side entrance of the chapel from Holt Avenue.
On a Saturday, that garage is also close to the end of the parade route, which leads to the morning.
The 74th Annual Winter Park Christmas Parade runs from 9 to 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, December 5. It heads south on Park Avenue from Cole Avenue and ends at Lyman Avenue. More than 80 organizations take part, including marching bands, local police and fire departments, scouting groups and local dignitaries, with Santa Claus at the end. The Winter Park Chamber of Commerce calls it the oldest continuous holiday parade in Central Florida.
Pop-Up Bagels is listed among the parade's sponsors. There's also a newer place for coffee before the parade. Bungalower reported that Mecatos Bakery & Cafe soft-opened on October 6 at 610 W. Morse Boulevard, in the former Coop space, serving Colombian coffee and baked goods.
Friday night and Saturday morning share most of the same streets. In December 2025, the city's holiday road-closure notice closed downtown streets at 2 p.m. on the Friday of Winter on the Avenue and kept them closed until noon Saturday. These streets were closed:
More closures for the parade started at 6 a.m. Saturday. Those covered Park and New York avenues from Webster to West Canton, Lyman from Park to Interlachen, and the side streets that cross Park Avenue along the route. Those were last year's closures. They show how the downtown grid tends to close from Friday afternoon through Saturday morning, so anyone who lives or parks near Park Avenue should plan to move their car on Friday, not Saturday.
The city's downtown parking and cultural guide marks the free three-hour and four-hour spaces, the free and paid public lots, and the four-hour Truist garage. The Morse also notes that Central Park is a short walk from the SunRail station.
This is the first holiday weekend on the finished section of Park Avenue. WFTV reported in October that Phase 1 of the Park Avenue Refresh was complete, including sidewalk repairs, new streetlights and safety improvements. The city's Phase 1 media alert lists more of the work. That includes repairs to curbs and planters, pedestrian-safety treatments, new dark-sky streetlights, landscaping, bollards, and new waste and recycling bins.
The city expects Phase 2 to start in January 2027, covering Park Avenue from Garfield to New England avenues. The Tiffany windows go up at the Garfield end of Central Park on December 3, the same block where the next phase of work is scheduled to begin about a month later. All of this year's December events fall between the two phases.
Central Park is busy before the holidays start, too. The free Autumn Art Festival is set for the weekend of November 14 and 15, in Central Park along Park Avenue. Then comes the Morse's Friday night on November 27, the windows on December 3, the street party on the 4th, the parade on the morning of the 5th and Vespers on the evening of your choice. The city keeps a running holiday events calendar for anyone who wants to add the smaller events too.
If relatives are coming for parade weekend and start asking what it's like to live within walking distance of Central Park, Gwyn Picerne is happy to have that conversation over coffee on Morse Boulevard. Let's connect and start the conversation whenever the holiday rush settles down.
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