It’s lit! Which home in the Charlotte area has the best holiday display?
Every holiday season, CharlotteFive seeks out the best and brightest holiday lights displays around Charlotte for the annual Readers’ Choice Awards for Best Holiday display.
From Matthews to Lake Norman and everywhere in between, our readers sent in a long list of their favorite festive homes decked out with creative Christmas displays, twinkling lights, over-the-top inflatables and more.
After 35 nominations, our readers have voted for the best of the best.
If you want to get in the holiday spirit, make sure to check out all of the homes that have transformed into winter wonderlands for Christmas, including the top picks that were voted the best holiday display:
Winner: 1201 Merribrook Drive, Matthews
Neighborhood: Brightmoor
Holiday light displays have been an annual tradition for David and Laurie Rumble and their family for years.
“We’ve been doing Christmas lights for only 20 years. Started when our boys were younger and grew from there,” Laurie Rumble told CharlotteFive. “It’s become kind of a neighborhood thing for us here. All the kids in the neighborhood love to come here.”
Every year, the family comes up with new ideas to decorate their home for the holidays, from twinkling lights, signs and more. They even have festive displays in honor of other children on their street, including a hide-and-seek game with elves named after their neighbors.
“It’s just grown through the years and it just brings us so much joy to be able to share this with other people and our community,” Rumble said. “Thank you so much for all your support and all your love. We really have a great time doing this, and all the people that vote for us are the reason we do it. It makes it worth it to us.”
Runner-up: 631 Ennis Road, Waxhaw
Neighborhood: Waxhaw
Rich Watson — who calls himself a “local Griswold” from “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” — has always loved putting up holiday lights with his wife Flor and the rest of his family.
“I’ve been doing it since I was a kid. Once ‘Christmas Vacation’ came out, I think maybe two or three years after, I started putting lights on the house and Mom was saying ‘Get off the roof’ and all that kind of stuff … and then it just blossomed,” Watson told CharlotteFive. “Every year, we try to come up with a new theme. Something different to do.”
Decorating his home isn’t just a family tradition, but also part of his professional life, too. When Watson isn’t decking the halls of his own home, he’s also working as the Director of Elves for cltElf, a local holiday lighting company for businesses and homes.
“Someday I’d love to open a park to do lighting but my wife’s going to kill me when we do that,” Watson joked.
“For everybody that’s been voting for us, thank you very much … friends, family, clients, neighbors, people that come by.”
This story was originally published December 21, 2023 at 6:00 AM.
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