All that glitters may not be gold, but it sure is Christmassy.
And while red and green are traditional, they aren’t the only seasonal colours to be found on trees this year. Teal is the new “in” colour for tree decorations, followed closely by lime green, purple and even black. As long as they sparkle, these new designer colours may be as festive as anything you have stored in the old Christmas decorations box.
Never before has Christmas shone so much in quite the same way. Even the flowers are decorated so they sparkle and nearly everything in every store, from table decorations to the ribbons for presents, is coated with glitter.
“There’s a lot of glitter,” agreed Enjoy Centre buyer Leasleah Horvat. “Red is still in. I’d say 75 per cent of all our Christmas sales are still red but lime is the new hot green instead of the traditional Christmas green and all the decorations are covered with glitter.”
To add extra spark, the flower-veins in traditional poinsettias are outlined with glitter. In addition, strange, almost-other-world-shaped spiraling batons – coated with still more glitter – have been thrust into the soil beside the plants so they almost outshine the beauty of the flowers.
These beaded wand-like batons are everywhere and in every store and are sometimes bundled together to make a tree topper.
“It’s easy to put together a topper out of these glittery sticks,” said Seasons Gift Shop owner Heather Wolsey.
Wolsey used a twist-tie to join a total of five peacock-coloured wands together for the top of her own home tree.
“To complete the look I added a teal-coloured dragonfly to the arrangement,” Wolsey said, as she explained that almost every year she tries for a new look in her Christmas decorations.
Wolsey said that at the different shows she attended as a store-buyer she saw teal and purple used in many Christmas displays.
“Teal is strong because if you think about it, it goes so well with the grey that is used on the walls in so many modern homes. Most show homes have cement-coloured walls, or taupe walls or soft dove-coloured walls and teal is gorgeous with grey,” she said.
Wolsey says the knack to decorating a tree is to use only three colours.
On her tree, bronze and copper decorations are the foundation of the arrangement and the teal is the highlight.
“If you use three colours, it doesn’t get too busy looking. The third colour adds the pop, and in my case it’s teal,” she said.
Wolsey’s floor plan is open and so, to tie her theme together, she added a hint of teal to every room.
“You can see the whole floor at a glance so I add a touch of teal in other ways throughout the house. I have teal throw cushions on the couch and the kitchen light fixture has teal balls on it,” she said.
Perhaps the most outlandish designer trees can be found at Modern Eyes Gallery. One silver tree is decorated with black ribbon along with purple and wine-coloured glass balls. Another champagne-coloured tree is elegantly festooned with faux flowers including cream-coloured chrysanthemums, hydrangeas, dahlias, calla lilies, white tulips and a dozen white roses. To provide contrast, owner Jody Reekie and her staff added lime-green coloured beads and mocha-coloured glass balls.
“My staff and I went to a floral-designer show and saw there is no right way and no wrong way to decorate a tree. It’s OK to try to produce something you don’t expect. I don’t sell these tree decorations, but I do sell whimsical Christmas ornaments and these trees are whimsical,” Reekie said.
Reekie advises anyone who attempts to use the faux flowers on a tree to use a lot of decorations.
“If you think about it, I have a dozen roses on the tree so it takes a lot to fill it up,” she warned.
“You don’t want to space every ornament in a mathematical way like an equation. I put the balls on in threes so there is a cluster of three balls and then a little space,” said Wolsey, who added that though it may seem early to put up Christmas decorations, she finds that when she does do it in November, she enjoys the holiday more.
“I decorated my tree on that snow-day we had a few weeks ago. I put on Christmas music and made myself a cup of coffee and took time to really enjoy it,” she said. “I had time to put into my design rather than waiting until the last minute and having to put it up in a big rush.”
