Palm Springs Couple “Lights Up” for Good Causes & History
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Palm Trees Lit for Important Days Starting Last Night
with Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
Tonight to Honor COVID Death Toll
& Wednesday’s Inauguration
www.PalmSpringsColors.com
Idea Hoped to be Catalyst for Official Lightings in PS and CV
18 January 2021 – Palm Springs, CA: Inspired by memorable lightings around the country during COVID, two Palm Springs residents have taken the idea to heart – and to home. Beginning tonight — Martin Luther King, Jr. Day — Alfredo Casuso & David Perry will light up the LED powered palm trees in front of their Los Compadres home in ever changing rainbow hues to mark important days in history, national commemorations honoring nonprofits and charities and other significant dates. It’s an idea they hope will grow and get picked up and magnified at a community and official level.
The schedule for their palm trees palette is online at www.PalmSpringsColors.com including a special star spangled display for tomorrow’s Presidential Inauguration. Tonight as part of the nationwide tribute coordinated by the Biden Inaugural Committee, the trees will be lit AMBER to honor all those who have died from COVID-19.
“A dear friend of ours, the Rev. Anthony Turney, used to say: ‘timing is important but lighting is everything,’ ”said Casuso and Perry in a statement. “2020 was a rough year and 2021 can use all the light it can get to brighten our lives and our lessons. We’re hoping that our neighbors, and our local governments, will pick up the idea. Our idea is that perhaps Palm Springs Airport, City Hall and various iconic buildings through the Coachella Valley will ‘light up’ to bring attention to important commemorative days through the year.”
Owners of a public relations and design firm, Casuso and Perry moved their fulltime residence to Palm Springs in 2015 but maintain a client base both here and in San Francisco including work with several SF mayoral administrations. Over the years, one of the iconic images transmitted internationally has been San Francisco City Hall lit for various causes: rainbow for LGBT Pride; Purple for Cleft Palate Awareness Day; Red, White & Blue for July 4th. This past April, in honor of the devastating death toll from COVID in Spain, Casuso and Perry, working with the Spanish Consul General, pushed to have City Hall lit in the colors of that country: Red & Gold. Those images went around the world and were picked up by international press outlets.
“That’s when I began thinking. We can do it here, on our own,” said Casuso.
As the months dragged on and COVID surge followed by COVID surge, the idea fell onto the back burner.
“Then it was Christmas and we always put up lights, lots of lights,” said Perry. “It clicked: Instead of putting up temporary decorations, let’s install lights that we can change for every occasion.”
Through the miracle of LEDs and an iPhone app, the couple had their very own palm trees palette.
“We can all use a little more light after 2020,’ said Casuso. “And what better time to start a new tradition than this week.”
Tonight, in honor or Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day the couple’s palm trees will be lit in the colors of his birth state, Georgia: Red, Gold and Blue.
“And for Inauguration Day, as it should be,” said Perry, “Red, White and Blue.”
Following is the complete schedule through February, published online at www.PalmSpringsColors.com. Casuso and Perry are hoping the idea will grow and get picked up by neighbors and by local city governments.
January 18 — for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day: RED, YELLOW (GOLD) & BLUE, colors of the state of Georgia where MLK, Jr. was born.
January 19 — In memory of all those lost to COVID-19 as part of the Inaugural Committee coordinated effort: AMBER
January 20 — Presidential Inauguration: RED, WHITE & BLUE
January 24 — The day in 1848 Gold was discovered in California: ALL GOLD
January 27 — 1945 Auschwitz Liberated – International Holocaust Remembrance Day: BLUE & WHITE
January 30 — San Francisco naming day, 1847: Colors of San Francisco – RED & GOLD
February 1 — National Freedom Day, honoring the signing by Abraham Lincoln of a joint House and Senate resolution that later became the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. President Lincoln signed the Amendment outlawing slavery on February 1, 1865: RED, BLACK, GREEN
February 4 — World Cancer Day: BLUE & ORANGE
February 11 — Nelson Mandela released from Prison: GREEN, BLACK, GOLD
February 12 — Chinese / Lunar New Year, “The Year of the Ox”: ALL RED
February 27 — On February 27, 1922, the 19th Amendment is upheld by the United States Supreme Court, defending women’s voting rights: WHITE the colors of the Suffragists.