5 top Illuminate Adelaide events

Posted 15 May, 2025 Andrew Rasch

Each winter, one of our state’s biggest and brightest (no pun intended) events, Illuminate Adelaide, comes to town. This year the festival will light up the city from 2-20 July.

With such a packed program, you’re spoilt for choice. So, if you need some help maximising your time among the spellbinding sights and sounds, read on.

Best new show

Adelaide Botanic Garden is always beautiful, but it’ll be truly hypnotic when the all-new Night Visions takes over. Cutting-edge lights, lasers, projections and sound will transform and reimagine the tranquil gardens as an after-dark hub of immersive technology and a gateway into the unknown. Featuring work by local and international artists, prepare to be amazed. Best of all, RAA members receive exclusive discounts to Night Visions.

Best free show

The gong goes to the ever-popular City Lights, running from 4-20 July. Spanning North Terrace from Lot Fourteen to Festival Plaza, you’ll see our famous cultural institutions lit up in spectacular ways, including the luminous horses of FierS à Cheval, and giant goldfish in The Legend of the Golden Koi. The South Australian Museum lawns will come alive with enormous, coloured orbs in moonGARDEN and don’t miss the range of glowing, interactive installations in Rundle Illuminations in the East End.

Best family friendly show

Travel back millions of years and roam with the dinosaurs after dark when Universal Kingdom: The Next Era heads to the Adelaide Zoo. This is the latest instalment in the dino series after last year’s big hit, Prehistoric Nights. Kids (and grown-ups) will love meeting a three-horned Triceratops and watching a winged Pterodactyl soar overhead. You’ll also have the chance to pat baby dinosaurs, test your speed against superfast raptors and tremble as a Tyrannosaurus Rex thunders nearby.

Best high-tech show

Nothing beats cheering on your favourite team at the Adelaide Oval – nothing but the dazzling new show, Horizons, that is. For one night only, on 18 July, Horizons will turn our world-famous oval into a huge canvas, with hundreds of illuminated drones dotted throughout the sky. State-of-the-art lighting, audio and screen technology will tell a story of our past, present and where we want the future to take us. It’s the best thing to happen to the Adelaide Oval since AFL footy.

Best way to unwind

Crowd-favourite RAA Lounge is back again at Base Camp at Lot Fourteen. Head to Base Camp before or after your light-filled travels and relax and warm your bones by a crackling fire pit. Enjoy a beef rib banh mi or a fluffy cinnamon doughnut and get yourself a cool or warm drink to recharge your batteries before you head off to the next unmissable exhibition.