A Styled, But Collected Christmas Tree
I love Christmas decor. Can’t get enough. It makes everything feel so much cozier and always brings a smile to my face. There are so many fun “themes” you can go with and if I had a huge house with lots of rooms I’m sure I’d experiment with lots of different trees in different themes, but my favorite is just classic, collected, maybe a little vintage and FULL. Definitely in the more is more camp when it comes to Christmas decor and especially ornaments on a tree. I think I’ve finally come up with a formula for decorating our main tree that makes it feel full and festive, collected over time with special pieces and family ornaments, but also still aesthetically pleasing without looking too cold and commercial without any sentimentality. Here are a few of my tips.
Choose a grounding color theme to carry throughout. I love red. Nothing says Christmas like green and red. It’ll never go out of style, it’s easy to find and incorporate in lots of different ways and it’s perfectly classic. We have classic red ball ornaments in varying sizes, but then you can add in whimsy with mushrooms, candy canes, red cardinals, homemade Santa handprints. And they all pop against the green tree so nicely.
Get some staple pieces in sets to create cohesion and put those on first. I have large red ball ornaments with a white pattern on them and then medium sized white ball ornaments with green and red berries. After the lights, I put these on first, making sure to spread them out strategically around the tree, giving your eye something to bounce around from. These are my “base” ornaments. I think they are what keep the tree looking classic and styled even when you add in your family and collected ornaments. I will also add in more of the classic ball ornaments in varying sizes in red, creams and golds, but those can be filler after you’ve put on your fun ornaments.
Add in your collected and family ornaments next, but pay attention to the colors and try spread out evenly. These are the fun ornaments I mentioned above, the keepsake family ornaments, handmade or milestone ornaments, quirky ones you’ve picked up at antique stores or in your travels. They give life and fun to your tree making sure it doesn’t look generic, but instead cozy and lived in, collected over time and loved.
Mix materials. Glass, wood, felt—I like having a mixture of materials for the tree. We also add red wooden beaded garland around the tree to add in another element. My current tactic with a little one at home is to try to use mostly the felt and unbreakable ornaments closer the bottom, but in order to follow my second step, you can’t necessarily avoid all the breakable ones if your base pieces are glass you’ll end up with some on the bottom too. So far, we’ve been lucky, and we’re just good at reminding Levi that ornaments are decorations for looking at. (And he has a small tree in his room that he can move and rearrange on his own when he likes).
Build your collection over time. Usually you can tell when all your ornaments are bought at once. They don’t look personal, take your time collecting them, it makes it more fun and meaningful. If you want a hack to hurry that process a little bit, I can’t recommend buying used/vintage more. That way, you will find really unique and individual pieces.
Again, I really encourage you to build a collection over time, but I’ve included some things you can start with below and search “vintage Christmas ornaments” on Etsy or Ebay! Some keywords I would search for are mushrooms, vintage wooden, nutcracker, icicle and don’t get me started on food ornaments, I LOVE food ornaments, we have a whole garland full of just food ornaments in our kitchen.
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