Create an eye-catching focal point for your living room over Christmas
Christmas is the time when you can really let your artistic flair come to the fore, and here at Hayes Garden World we always have a massive choice of decorations, garlands, trees, lights and everything else you need to make your home extra special over the festive season. If you want some different ideas for decorating your mantelpiece this short video shows you how easy it is to put together several different elements to create a stunning decorative piece. The same principles can be applied to making a stunning table centrepiece (just click the link below to watch Yvonne creating a table centrepiece in more traditional Christmas colours). You don’t need any special skills, anyone can follow the simple instructions and end up with a mantelpiece decoration to rival even the most professional flower arranger’s.
For this decoration you will need:
- 1 x garland of soft gold leaves
- 3 x medium sized baubles
- 3 x smaller baubles
- 3 x balls of conifer twigs
- 3 x 3D open stars
- 3 x large metal leaves
- twig sprays
- sprays of cones
- 2 x stag’s heads
- 2 x candlesticks
- 2 x medium church candles
The basis of the decoration is a garland of soft gold leaves and the first thing to be added is a medium sized bauble. Three baubles are placed equal distances apart down the garland and these give you the basis from which to add all your other pieces. Yvonne glues on the larger pieces, which can sometimes be quite difficult when the decorations are heavily glittered. A ball of conifer twigs, leaves, another bauble contrasting to the first one and a 3D star are added to this group of decorations.
The twig and cone sprays are wired onto the garland close to the three groups of decorations to add some body and just another dimension to the garland. The final stage is to place the garland onto the mantelpiece then you can do any adjustments, clean off any stray strings of glue, take any tags off the baubles, pull leaves into shape and place some of the pieces over the front of the mantle to soften the edge. We have also added a couple of bronze stag’s heads and candle sticks holding church candles. You can also add a small string of battery lights just to add another dimension; with this colour palette amber or warm white would work really well.
You don’t necessarily have to use just the standard green garland, but garlands of leaves, berries, flocked conifer branches or just glittery twig branches will all work equally well as a basis for making your mantle decoration. If you want to make a really cheap mantle decoration go for a walk in the countryside or wander round the garden and collect some conifer or evergreen branches for the base, substitute bunches of berries and crab apples or cones for the baubles and different coloured leaves for the glitter sprays of twigs and cones; you could also include some rustic Christmas decorations or dried fruit. To further keep down the cost you can add pieces of everyday home-wares which, such as ornaments, candles and candlesticks, are not necessarily Christmassy.
The cool, frosty mantle decoration Yvonne also created in white, silver and charcoal was made from a base of white sprayed frosted branches, cool white LED lights, various sprays and snowflakes.
