Best Christmas Tree Decorations in 2021

Features to Look for in Christmas Tree Decorations

Type – Christmas is a global holiday celebrated just about everywhere on earth. With such a broad group of people celebrating the same holiday, there's sure to be a lot of variety in modern Christmas tree decorating you'll find from around the globe. With so many different ways to decorate the tree, it's easy to see why people would fall back on their old way of doing things and keep the look the same each year, but what's the fun in that?

Glass ball ornaments are one of the most iconic and common decorations you'll find around the world. Also known as "baubles," these little balls are often adorned with people's names or memories from throughout the year to remind them of all of their good fortunes.

Extending on from the glass ball ornaments are more options made of glass, but in different forms and sizes. Glass blowers have really expanded the glass options, replicating things like icicles and teardrops and other various forms.

Christmas tree garlands and tinsels are also a common way to class up your tree. This style of decoration brings the look of a snowy landscape into your home's interior, without the chill! Garland comes in many different fashions. You may recall stringing popcorn or greenery onto dental floss or thread as a child. That, my friend, is a garland! However, if you don't feel like wasting your beloved popcorn on your tree, you can buy artificial garland that comes in many great shapes and sizes.

Christmas lights are another common way to decorate the tree, and like many of the other options on this list, they come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Yellow, white, and red are the most common colors you'll find when shopping for tree lighting, but a quick search of Amazon will turn up an enormous amount of colors to match any style.

Finally, the tree topper. It's hard to call a Christmas tree fully decorated without something adorning its very top. The star or an angel is among the most common to sit atop your Christmas conifer, but any manor of a symbol can work; it's your holiday, after all!

Material – The construction of your Christmas tree decorations should be of utmost concern to you. Many people like to keep decorations from year to year, storing them in some out-of-the-way space in their house. Often these decorations receive a hurried pack up and then sit for a year, so ensuring that your items have the kind of design quality that will allow them to make it a few seasons should be important!

The standard bulb decorations you see most commonly on Christmas trees are very thin glass covered in a thinner layer of spray paint. So when storing these for the year, you should take extra precautions to pack them in a way that they don't turn into dust over the summer.

The lights you most commonly find on Christmas trees are incandescent bulbs, meaning they are old school! Some companies are now beginning to make LED Christmas lights, which not only look great but are also far easier on your electricity bill and the environment. So if you're in the market for some new lights this year, look for the LED on the box!

Color – For some decorators, the holidays are a time for great color around the house. Reds and greens abound in a classically decorated home. Silver and gold are also a nice touch when it comes to class the place up a bit. Just don't go too crazy!

An all-white Christmas can be a nice touch, too. This classy look takes some doing, but it's possible to find a tree, garland, tinsel, wrapping paper, and just about anything else you need in this clean aesthetic.

Finally, a rustic Christmas might feel a little more appropriate to you. If so, there's an endless supply of wood-themed ornaments and decorations to bring that log cabin feeling into your home. Nothing feels more like Christmas than a rustic aesthetic, a roaring fire, and a steaming hot beverage in your hand!

Glitter – Don't. Not even once. Lest you want to be picking glitter flecks out of your hair and carpet for the rest of the year, glitter is a bad look.

If you insist on the sparkly stuff, we highly advise you to look for something with "No Mess" in the product name. These cleverly designed decorations ensure that the glitter is tight enough that no amount of abrasion will knock them free. You'll thank us when you're not spending your weekend's lint rolling the carpet.

Christmas Tree Decoration FAQ

Q: How do you decorate the best Christmas tree?

A: If you really want to decorate your tree like the pros, you can break down the assembly in three easy steps. However, before you get started, you'll want to think long and hard about a vision for your tree once it's complete. This will allow you to keep a final product in mind as you layer on all the decorations ensuring that the final product meets your desired outcome.

Step one is all about the lights. If your goal is to keep the overall design minimal and clean, you'll want to consider a single color of lights and not too many of them! If the goal is maximal impact, organized chaos, then pull out every string of light you have, including every color. Always start by stringing your lights at the end of their string, starting at the top. Work your way down in spiraling fashion, affixing the string to branches here and there. Your Christmas tree is an asymmetrical organism so don't get too caught up with making a perfect spiral.

Next, you'll move on to the all-important garland. Remember that long string of dental floss that holds thousands of kernels of popcorn? Ya, that's the ticket. Now, whether you've got Orville Redenbacher on a string or a beautifully painted set of beads, go about applying these to the tree in the same fashion as the lights. You might wish to string them alongside the lights or in a crosshatch pattern by going the opposite direction. Just know that the lights play with the rest of the ornaments, shining their light forth and reflecting off everything, so plan your garland placement accordingly.

Finally, the ornaments and topper. Whether you are working with a collection of ornaments you've procured over a long Christmas-loving life, or you're starting fresh, take a look at your whole kit. Depending on how many ornaments you need to place, you'll want to think strategically about where they go so you don't crowd the tree or run out before you fill the whole thing up. If your tree's position is in a corner, you can save yourself some time and adorn the tree's forward-facing element and avoid the back. Once you've got them all in place, finish your hard work by placing your tree-topper on, pivot it in the right direction, and then take a giant step back to admire your work.

Q: What is the most popular ornament on a Christmas tree?

A: The tree topper is likely the most universally accepted element of tree decoration. This highly popular item ranges in design from snowflake to star, to an angel, all the way to baby Jesus! But what you put atop your noble fir is up to you! Just make sure it's on straight.

Q: What do the balls on a Christmas tree represent?

A: The round plastic or glass ornaments that you see on most Christmas trees originated in Germany. Their round shape has taken on a wide variety of meanings over the years, but the original inspiration for the "bauble," as the Germans call it, was fruits and nuts.

Q: Do you put garland on a tree before ornaments?

A: According to tree decorating experts, the garland is best laid on the tree after the lights and before the ornaments. Applying the garland in this sequence allows the decorator to observe how and where the lights have been placed and allow the garland to flow onto the tree unencumbered by the obstruction of ornaments. Once both the lights and garland are in a proper place, the decorator can begin to fill in the gaps and balance out the tree with ornaments.

Q: How do you put ornaments on a Christmas tree?

A: Before you begin to hang the ornaments on the tree, it is a good idea to lay them out to get a full view of what you are working with. Once you've got a mental inventory of everything that needs to hit the tree, you can strategically begin to layer on the ornaments.

Hooks are a common accompaniment to many ornaments and basically works as a coat hanger for your ornament. Hooks are a great option as they do not need to be replaced every year and offer an added touch of glitz to each ornament. Ribbons and florist wire are also fairly common. The ribbon is typically tied in a loop and allows you to dangle the ornament from a tree branch. Because they aren't rigged, the ornament will sway if the tree gets brushed, so keep that in mind.

Florist wire is a very thin wire coated in plastic or rubber. This wire accompanies many of the less expensive ornaments on the market. The upside of florist wire is that you can shape it into any design you wish, so if you want to twist an ornament very tightly to a branch, florist wire will allow for that. Typically its color is green or black, so it blends into the tree and makes the ornaments look like they are floating below their hanging branch.

Q: How do you pack Christmas decorations after taking them down?

A: There are a lot of bad ways to pack your Christmas decorations, that's for sure. If you really want to take this task seriously and avoid emptying a box of broken bulbs next year, you'll want to buy some supplies. Just like moving your house, the right supplies can make all the difference. So buying some packing paper, tape, boxes, and foam rolls can do a lot to keep your precious ornaments in great shape each year.

When figuring out how to box each piece, consider combining fragile items into one box, and go crazy with the foam and bubble wrap. Once you're done, tape it up really well and clearly label on the box that its contents are incredibly fragile.

As the final boss in Mario brothers, the Christmas lights are the true and ultimate test of your abilities to pack up the holiday. One of the best methods we found in our extensive research was to utilize some hangers. Imagine wrapping your lights around the hanger vertically and taping each end to opposite sides of the hanger. This will allow you to unfurl them the following year effortlessly; no matter how hard you jostle their storage box, they'll still be in a clean roll.

Sources:

1. The History Of Christmas Trees - History