Transportation Minister Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) and Taoyuan Mayor Chang San-cheng (張善政) revealed the lantern designs on Friday for this year’s Lantern Festival. In the Year of the Snake, the theme will be “Infinite Paradise”, with smaller lanterns capable of being manipulated into different shapes.
The “2025 Taiwan Lantern Festival” display will be at the Taoyuan High-Speed Rail Station starting February 12 to 23. Since 2025 is the Year of the Snake, both the Tourism and Transportation Ministries approached well-known artist Li Ming-dao (李明道), or Akibo, to design this year’s 18-meter main lantern around the infinity theme. The lantern will display images celebrating Taiwan’s baseball victory and foreign exchange students writing well-wishes to Taiwan in their native languages.
For the small lanterns, designer Lin Chia-wei (林佳葦) incorporated “36” into the design for the 36th Lantern Festival and the 36th year of Taiwanese baseball. This year’s smaller lanterns are uniquely designed after the idea of a flexible toy snake, made of a seven-segment movable structure. This allows the lanterns to be twisted into the numbers zero through nine, and are compatible with type-c power chargers allowing them to light up.
The festival's overall theme of “infinite paradise”, while taking advantage of the snake’s flexible nature, also carries a lucky meaning for not only individual prosperity but also the “infinite possibilities” for Taiwan in the coming year.