The Blackpool Illuminations is an annual light festival founded in 1879 that first started on 18 September of that year and is held every autumn in the British seaside resort of Blackpool on the Fylde coast in Lancashire. Also known locally as The Lights or The Illuminations, they run for 66 days each year, from late August to early November, when most other English seaside resort seasons are coming to an end. They are 6.2 miles (10 km) long and use more than a million bulbs. The show stretches along the promenade from Star Gate at the southern end of the town to Bispham in the north.