A good Christmas tree should be the centrepiece of the festive decorations.
Achieving the desired effect is partly a matter of selecting a good quality tree to begin with, but also of making sure that it is decorated in an attractive manner.
A clumsily decorated tree will undermine the overall effect of your festive efforts, but getting the sort of tree you see in big department stores is not always straightforward. Like any other form of decorating, putting together an aesthetic Christmas tree requires an eye for where things should be placed, and knowing when you’re going overboard.
Keep reading if you would like to learn the secrets to decorating your tree like a pro.
Choose your tree
When it comes to selecting your Christmas tree, you have a choice between real or artificial.
More people are opting for artificial Christmas trees these days, due to their tidiness, ease of installation, and the fact that they are generally the cheaper option. That lower cost means that you can usually get a high quality one without setting your finances back.
The other thing to consider is what style of tree you want. You can get a modern one in an unusual shape and colour, or a traditional green pine-style tree. Picking the latter will be better for most people, as traditional Christmas trees never go out of fashion.
Decide on your theme
One of the most common reasons for bad Christmas tree decorations is the lack of a unifying theme. It leaves people with a colour-clashing tangle of lights, baubles and other ornamentation.
Deciding on a theme can mean choosing a colour palette, such as warm colours like red, or cooler shades like blues and whites, or a particular style of decoration. Once you have selected a palette, stick with it for a more elegant finish.
Some companies that stock trees and decorations divide them into themes to help you with this process.
Shape the tree branches
Artificial trees are packaged with their branches down, so you will need to take the time to spread them out from the main body and ‘fluff’ them a little before adding any decorations.
Properly separating the branches will mean that the baubles and lights are not bunched together in a chaos of colour, but stand out clearly from each other. It will also mean that the tree is symmetrical, and more aesthetically pleasing to the eye.
Begin with the lights
The coloured fairy lights should always be the first piece of decoration added to the tree. Of course, these days, a lot of people buy pre-lit Christmas trees, and if you do so, you shouldn’t need to add further lights, because they will make the tree seem a bit too bright.
If the lights are on a string, drape them carefully around the branches, ensuring it covers as many of them as possible. You want the lights to be well spaced, without great gaps in the branches, and for the lights to be visible from all angles.
Position the baubles carefully
Now it will be time to think about those baubles that catch the lights and twinkle.
To create a professional look, buy packs of baubles that contain a variety of different sizes and shapes. Then, when it comes to hanging them, try to be as even as possible – if you want to have baubles, then no branch of your tree should be left empty.
The arrangement of the baubles will do a lot to determine the end product of your tree. Think about placing the ones that are larger at the back of the tree, because doing so will create an illusion of depth to those looking at it.
Stick to a single colour at a time, and work from the inside branches towards the outer ones, taking a step back periodically to have a look at how balanced the effect is.
Of course, you may prefer to just have the lights. If you have chosen a pre-lit tree with lights that change colour, adding lots of other decorations can clutter it and blunt the effect of these.
Top it off appropriately
The last step in decorating your Christmas tree professionally is to think about the top. Something fancy can be effective on the top of an artificial tree, but really, what you choose will depend on your theme. If you have picked a traditional style for your tree, a classic festive angel on top will align nicely with that.
On the other hand, if you have gone for an individualistic modern theme, you may prefer something more eccentric. For example, a light-up star or even a disco glitter ball ornament.
Hopefully, these tips will have you on the way to decorate your own professional-looking Christmas tree.