How to Decorate Your Christmas Tree Like a Professional Designer

Would you like to have an elegant designer Christmas tree this year? See the steps below for instructions on how to decorate your Christmas tree in a professional manner, just as an interior designer would.

1) Decide on the overall color scheme that you would like to use on your Christmas tree. It could be all green, red & gold, red & silver, pink & white, aqua & turquoise, or any other color combination that you like. The color scheme you select for your Christmas tree should compliment the color scheme of the room your tree is going into. Consider using some of the non traditional designer ornament colors available this year, such as bronze, peacock blue, plum, sage green, and navy, to give your Christmas tree an updated designer look.

2) Decide if you want to have a theme, such as angels, nutcrackers, snowflakes, shoes, or any other theme. Having a theme for your Christmas tree is optional.

3) Shop for Christmas ornaments, garland, feathers, florals, ribbon, beads, and any other designer items that are in your color scheme. Make sure the ornaments and other trimmings you select are over sized and larger than standard ornaments to get a professional designer look. Multi-pack Christmas ornaments work great because they are usually less expensive, but purchase different styles of multi-pack ornaments so not all the ornaments look exactly alike. You can get multi-packs at hardware stores, craft stores, discount stores, and online. 10 large Christmas ornaments per foot height of tree works well. Consider using natural elements to decorate you Christmas tree with, such as pine cones, grapevine, or twigs. You can also decorate using artificial natural elements such as ornaments made to look like birds or butterflies and artificial greenery such as poinsettia and magnolia flowers.

4) Before decorating your Christmas tree with ornaments, you should put your Christmas lights on your tree. Use either clear or white for a professional designer look. Make sure you put the lights on evenly around your Christmas tree, both towards the trunk and the outside of the tree. 100 mini lights per foot of tree is suggested. If you have a 6' tree, you should use 600 lights or 6 strands with 100 lights per strand.

5) After the lights are on and you have checked to make sure they are all working properly, add the garlands, florals, ribbons, and any decoration that is not an ornament to your Christmas tree. There are many designer ways to add garlands or ribbon to your tree. One option is to add the garlands or ribbon running from the top to the bottom, tucking the garland or ribbon into the tree about every 2 foot. Another option is to run garlands or ribbon in a circle around the outside of the tree like a barber's pole. A third option is to run the garlands or ribbon in a circle just around the tree trunk, which works well with grapevine.

6) Next, decorate the Christmas tree with your new ornaments in the designer color scheme you have selected. Make sure to attach those ornaments evenly over the tree and periodically step back and look at your decorating progress. Keep putting the ornaments on evenly until you run out. Larger ornaments look best towards the bottom of your tree and your smaller ornaments look best towards the top of your tree.

7) Now it is time to decorate your Christmas tree using your family ornaments. You can decorate using a craft your child made in school, an ornament from your last vacation, or any other sentimental Christmas ornament. Christmas trees should be filled with memories, so consider purchasing a new ornament each year for your Christmas tree to remind you of something special. Your yearly ornament could be a small ornament photo frame with a photo of your children with Santa.

8) A tree topper finishes off the Christmas tree decorations. The tree topper could be a traditional star, Santa, a fancy designer bow, an angel, or anything else that will top off your tree.

9) For extra professional designer flair, color coordinate your Christmas gift wrap to your Christmas tree's color scheme. You can use multiple colors, textures, and patterns of paper and ribbon in your color scheme. Simple brown craft paper used as wrapping paper with a fancy bow is always a designer favorite.