Last year, two people collaborated to build and then put lettering on a wooden box that could be used to collect letters to Santa during the Sandy Hook Tree Lighting celebration.

This year a Newtown High School sophomore responded to a call for help, and turned the box into a new work of art just in time for this year’s tree lighting event on December 5. The updated mailbox — similar in style to a standing letter box, but scaled down to a child’s size — was placed in front of Sandy Hook Hair Co., where Santa would be mingling with guests of all ages within hours. Event organizers for weeks had been encouraging children to bring letters to Santa with them if they attended the tree lighting festivities, so Noël Carbone’s artwork was seen by hundreds of people right after it arrived.

Sharon Doherty, an active member of SHOP, the business organization that organizes the tree lightings, had reached out to Newtown High School, through its Naviance program, which among other things offers community service opportunities.

Ms Doherty’s request to the high school had been for someone to “jazz up” the mailbox, she told The Bee on December 1.

Ms Doherty said Carl Wheeler, a carpenter and friend of the Doherty family, built the mailbox for SHOP last year. It stands approximately two feet tall, and originally had red panels and white trim. The pitched top was also solid red.

Allison Hornak, owner of the former Mine Art! Gallery space in Sandy Hook Center, did lettering prior to last year’s tree lighting. In large white letters covering two of the four panels on top of the box, it was clear that this was Santa’s Mailbox.

A dropslot allowed children to safely put their letters into the box.

When she heard about the opportunity to decorate the box, Noël was both excited and scared.

“This was my first time doing something like this,” she said December 5. She prefers drawing, with colored pencils, she said, but also does a lot of work with tempera paint.

Noël used acrylic paint to detail the mailbox she said, and plenty of glitter to add holiday sparkle to the panels. What was once a box with four red panels is now an upgraded piece of art with four unique paintings.

The front of the mailbox has a painting of Santa in his sleigh, loaded with presents, and being pulled by reindeer. Moving around the mailbox, one panel depicts a happy snowman, complete with top hat, under a wintry tree; the next panel shows a calm winter sky over snowcapped pine trees; and the fourth panel is filled with a Christmas tree topped with a star, with wrapped presents beneath it.

In addition to the panels, Noël also repainted the trim, and painted sprigs of holly and red berries to each of the four posts.

Noël and her family — dad Chris, mom Silviane, and brother Michael — met with Ms Doherty by mid-afternoon that day so that they could deliver the updated mailbox in plenty of time for the tree lighting festivities that followed.

When Chris Carbone opened the hatch on the family’s car, Ms Doherty clapped her hands and smiled.

“Oh look at that!” she said. “It’s beautiful.”

As Noël talked about the work that went into the project — designing the scenes, then putting four hours of work for many nights on the panels, and then filling in the trim to update the entire mailbox — Ms Doherty, her son Jo-Jo, and Noël’s parents all checked out the finished project. 

 “I absolutely love it,” said Ms Doherty. “She did a fabulous job.”