Decorating Your Home At Christmas

Decorating your home and tree at Christmas is always fun and gives everyone a chance to be creative.  We get enormous satisfaction and enjoyment from decorating the shop.  This is the window we created this year.  As you can see we've gone for rather traditional, Victorian look...

The mix of decorations we're selling range from vintage tin hearts, beautiful glass baubles to pretty hand embellished fabric birds.  The latter arrived packaged in paper - not one bit of plastic or polystyrene to be found which added to my delight in seeing them for the first time!

Candles are a must at Christmas.  They give off a gorgeous light and I love the twinkly effect they create when reflected in glass.  These mini candle lanterns look great either grouped together or strategically placed.

Foraging for natural foliage to decorate the house has become an annual tradition in my household.  .  Look around the garden and hedgerows and you're guaranteed to find all sorts of greenery that you can use.  Consider weaving ivy around the banisters on your staircase.  Using natural foliage smells and looks lovely.  You can intersperse it with baubles or ribbons then finish off with a string of LED lights.

Here is a helpful article with ideas from 12 of us interior designers about how to style a staircase at Christmas.  https://www.jacksonwoodturners.co.uk/planning-advice/styling-staircase-christmas

Another simple but hugely effective decoration are oranges studded with cloves.  It takes a few minutes to do and they look fab when group together in a bowl or vase. To add more interest you can always include some fir cones.  Here are some we did and as you can see we've made use of one of our ceramic mixing bowls!

Glass baubles placed together in a bowl is also another super fast and simple idea that is extremely effective.

I hope this blog is helpful.  Please make use of your old decorations and, if you do have to buy more, take time to choose ones that have been made ethically and from sustainable products.

Happy Decorating !!

How to Light A Dining Room

Good lighting for a dining room is crucial especially as it often ends up being used for other purposes than just eating.   A dining room works well as a place to study or work, and surveys have found that they also regularly end up being used as a playroom.

Therefore how you light the room needs careful consideration.   When you are using it for eating the lighting should be warm and inviting with the table being the focal point of the room.  However, if you are using the during the day whether for work, study or play, then you will want it to be nice and bright.

 "Layering" the lighting, using different fittings and a good mix of lamps - floor and table - as well as installing dimmer switches will enable you turn the dining room into a multi-functional space.  To find out how best to achieve this and more, here is a really helpful article that I recently contributed to https://www.lampshoponline.com/advice-centre/dining-room-lighting