Christmas in October?

The giant Christmas tree is up and towering over Pittsburgh’s PPG Plaza.

For those who were wondering, the 60-foot, 11,939-pound tree is indeed fake. It has 540 pre-lit branches and was installed on Oct. 4 this year, according to Anthony Battistella, marketing manager at JLL property management. That’s actually not that early. Last year, the tree was installed around mid-October.

“We store it in Florida for most of the year, and they bring it up every season,” he said of Magic Ice, the company that installs the tree and ice rink annually. “Usually, early to mid-October is when they begin to install everything.”

Battistella said Florida-based Magic Ice installs similar displays across the United States.

“It was a bit (early), but not by much,” he said. “It really depends on their schedule since they put these up over the country.”

The ice rink is made of a foam platform, plywood, plastic and sand. Officials plan to fill it with water to make ice in November.

Its first day of skating will be Nov. 15, and the rink will be open through March 2, he said. Specific skate hours can be found online, which is where tickets can be purchased as well.

Light Up Night will return to Pittsburgh on Nov. 23, where the PPG Plaza tree will officially brighten the city for the holidays. And PPG’s life-sized Santa display will be installed at the beginning of November, Battistella said.

In the meantime, Battistella said a spooky Halloween display can be seen on the tree until the holiday next week.

“We know the tree’s up early, and it’s October,” he said. “We do have an LED show that depicts Halloween visuals.”

Though Highwoods Properties still owns PPG Place, Battistella said JLL became manager of the property in December 2022. He said it’s a normal addition for commercial real estate owners who are focused on other properties or not based in the area.

Highwoods is now mainly based in Raleigh, N.C., but the company used to have a team in Pittsburgh, he said. Now, JLL is the management on-site, according to Battistella.

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