Magical department store windows are hallmarks of the Christmas holidays in New York

A life-sized polar bear is smiling hungrily at a mannequin in a white fur coat. An ice crystal elf who looks alarmingly like one of the Borg in Star Trek is spinning over a dancing Manhattan skyline. And in the dusk, Andy Warhol’s giant eyes are glowing. It’s Christmastime in New York.

New York is one of the few remaining American cities to continue the 20th century tradition of department stores staging extravagantly decorated display windows for the holidays. Suburban shopping malls and big-box strips have wiped out the practice elsewhere.

But that doesn’t mean the windows you’ll see along Fifth Avenue and elsewhere in the city are traditional. A trip to view the 2006 crop of holiday displays revealed more postmodern cool than Currier & Ives. Here are the highlights:

Macy’s > The famous windows at Macy’s flagship store at Broadway and 34th Street helped pioneer display storytelling. This year, the windows on the store’s 34th Street side are old-fashioned dioramas of scenes from, what else? Miracle on 34th Street.

But Macy’s innovative side can be found in seven big windows facing Herald Square. The tale they tell, of two children on a magical adventure to find a new star for an enchanted tree, is pretty disposable.

But passels of kids on the sidewalk raced each other to tap interactive shapes on the windows that set a huge lion to roaring, launch a band of elfin musicians into song and, at a window framed by an enormous purple octopus, open a giant clamshell to reveal a mermaid.

Bloomingdale’s > If octopuses don’t sound Christmasy to you, over at Bloomingdale’s, at Third Avenue and 59th Street, the windows are among the most traditional in town. Colorful, oversized moving figures depict a range of winter holiday traditions.

Among the loveliest is the Hanukkah window, with a mirror-tile menorah backed by a Marc Chagall-style mural. Other lively windows include a dancing La Befana, the Italian Christmas figure, who has a tiny version of the Mona Lisa framed over her fireplace, and a sweet St. Lucia scene with candle-crowned girls in white.

Saks Fifth Avenue > Saks, at Fifth and 49th Street, this year is getting attention for its lighted snowflake display. Fifty huge LED-lighted flakes, some as much as 20 feet high, are spread across the 10-story building’s front. Starting each evening at 4:55, they shimmer in a 15-minute light show choreographed to Carol of the Bells.

The snowflakes are tied to the story told by Saks’ windows of Allie, an ice crystal who wants to be part of a snowflake but keeps getting rejected.

Helped by the kindly North Wind, she meets other misfits – including that character who looks like a Star Trek Borg in fact, he looks a lot like Capt. Picard in those Borg episodes. By the last window, all the ice crystals realize they can make their own snowflake.

The windows, glittering with thousands of Swarovski crystals against shades of white, silver, pale blues and pinks, have an art deco flair. When you reach the last one, you can turn around and look across the street and straight down a lane of angels with trumpets at the giant Rockefeller Center Christmas tree.

Time Warner Center > A new entry into the display wars this year is Time Warner Center on Columbus Circle. The 69-story tower, home to an upscale shopping mall and fine restaurants, has used its four-story glass atrium to frame a dozen enormous, multifaceted 3-D stars.

Each evening starting at 5, the stars, lit from within, change colors, in time to holiday music. They’re beautiful from outside, but for the best view, go inside the building and up to the second or third floor. There, the glowing stars are right in front of you, their images doubled by their reflections in the glass and backed by the lights of traffic streaming around Columbus Circle.

Bergdorf Goodman > Those stars are impressive, but for sheer artistic dazzle nothing beats the windows at Bergdorf Goodman. The luxury department store at Fifth Avenue and 49th Street emphasizes intricately detailed, sophisticated tableaux, many of which would look at home in an art gallery.

In previous years, the windows have had a theme; this year, aside from one-word captions like “Entertain” and “Recollect,” they don’t seem related to each other or even, necessarily, to the holidays.

But boy, are they gorgeous. My favorite was an amazing vignette, all in black and white, that places twin mannequins in velvet and ruffles amid dozens of vintage cameras, lights, framed photos and other memorabilia: an antique accordion, porcelain Boston terriers, a china hand pulling a photo of a rabbit out of a glass hat.

Two women stood next to me, gazing at the window intently, until one threw up her hands and said, “It takes so long to look at them!”

Barneys > Hands-down winner for retro cool windows is Barneys, on Madison Avenue at 61st Street, where the slogan is “Happy Andy Warhol-idays!” Yes, whenever I think of Christmas, I think of Andy Warhol.

Okay, so it doesn’t make much sense, but it makes for four very cool windows, each focusing on a decade in the life of the pop artist and professional celebrity.

The 1960s window is a scene recalling Warhol’s filmmaking days at the Factory, with an Edie Sedgwick mannequin standing on a silver sofa. The 1980s one, centered by a mammoth Warhol head with glowing eyes, is crammed with the kitschy crockery and cookie jars he collected.

Scattered around are quotes by Warhol “I am a deeply superficial person” and about him “Warhol is a sphinx without a secret”: Truman Capote.

Next to the door is a small square window stacked with a product tie-in: Campbell’s soup cans, in four color combos. They’re $12 and sell out as soon as the store gets them, a salesclerk said.

On the outside ledge of the window, someone has carefully perched a current consumer icon Warhol would no doubt be painting if he were still around: a holiday Starbucks cup.

If you go > Holiday style > Taking in holiday decorations at New York’s department stores is strictly a pedestrian expedition. Manhattan’s streets are even more gridlocked than usual this time of year, and you can’t see most of the displays from a cab or bus.

The windows are designed to be viewed from the sidewalk, where, if you can step out of the streaming throng, you can take a minute to absorb the details. Some stores set up railings along their windows to keep viewers out of the traffic flow; don’t slow down too much in these lines or a security person will be tapping your shoulder. Bring comfortable shoes and expect to spend several hours.

Photo tip > Because of the glare from the windows, it is difficult to capture the displays. Your best bet is to shoot during the day and make sure the camera’s flash is off.