Each Christmas in Melbourne brings a shop window display at Myer's southern frontage in the Bourke Street Mall. First held in 1956, the windows have become an institution of Melbourne Christmas. They were the brainchild of Fred Asmussen, who had been in charge of dressing the Bourke Street windows from 1939. The windows have an appeal across generations, as parents and grandparents, remembering trips to the windows in their childhood, continue the tradition with their own children. Bringing to life popular stories and Christmas themes through the use of innovative lighting, costumes and mechanisation, the windows follow in the tradition of a variety of moving window displays (for example, the tapping man). The scenes begin in the menswear window by the General Post Office. Asmussen's last window was The Butterfly Ball in 1974.
1956 | Santa and the Olympics |
1957 | The Nutcracker |
1958 | Aladdin |
1959 | Famous fairy tales |
1960 | I dreamed of Christmas in different lands |
1961 | Alice in Wonderland |
1962 | Santa's journey into space |
1963 | Cinderella |
1964 | Peter Pan |
1965 | Swan Lake |
1966 | Arabian Nights |
1967 | Chinese fairy tales |
1968 | It's a small world |
1969 | Sleeping Beauty |
1970 | Snugglepot and Cuddlepie |
1971 | Disney on parade |
1972 | Christmas around the world |
1973 | Coppelia |
1974 | The Butterfly Ball |
1975 | The twelve days of Christmas |
1976 | Peg Maltby's fairy tales |
1977 | The Snow Queen |
1978 | Snow White and the seven dwarfs |
1979 | An international Christmas |
1980 | A woodland Christmas |
1981 | Sinbad the sailor |
1982 | Gilbert and Sullivan |
1983 | A bear's Christmas |
1984 | Around the world in eighty days |
1985 | Fairy tales |
1986 | Nursery rhymes |
1987 | Myer bear celebrates Christmas |
1988 | Pinocchio |
1989 | Alice in Wonderland |
1990 | Peter Pan |
1991 | Cinderella |
1992 | Snow White and the seven dwarfs |
1993 | The Wizard of Oz |
1994 | Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer |
1995 | May Gibbs: the Gumnut Babies |
1996 | The retrospective |
1997 | Beatrix Potter |
1998 | Graeme Base: The eleventh hour |
1999 | Roald Dahl: Charlie and the chocolate factory |
2000 | Charles Dickens: A Christmas carol |
2001 | Kenneth Grahame: Wind in the willows |
2002 | The twelve days of Christmas |
2003 | Dr Seuss: How the Grinch stole Christmas |
2004 | Chris Van Allsburg: The polar express |
2005 | James Patterson: The Santa Kid |
2006 | Mem Fox: Wombat Devine |
2007 | Graeme Base: Uno's garden |