I am particularly fond of creating tablescapes. Other than cooking, it’s my favourite part of entertaining!
If I’m hosting a big holiday dinner, I usually like to start my tablescape a few days prior to the celebration. Planning ahead let’s me get creative, mixing and matching and DIYing where I can.
My Christmas décor theme this year is Winter Woodland. The vignette begins outside on the front porch and flows inside in the home décor and Christmas tree. So, to keep the theme going, my tablescape had to match.
Here’s what I did to design a Winter Woodland Tablescape:
1. Rustic Glam – Just because my theme is woodland, doesn’t mean that I don’t want a bit of glam! Adding small touches of gold throughout the table adds an element of sophistication. I brought in gold with the loosely woven rustic placemats, gold rimmed water glasses, coasters, and a single bell decoration on each plate (*I intend to DIY placecards – I’ll write names in gold sharpie on small white cards and place them into the bell bottom for a seating arrangement). I also took some leftover green leaf stems I had from planter making and spray painted them gold. After the stems dried, I added them to the centrepiece for a bit of shine. This is a quick and cheap design hack I use all year round in centrepieces and arrangements.
2. Layer & Light – Layering is an important part of all style and design. Whether it’s clothing (sweaters and undershirts) or tablescapes (plates), layering adds interest, depth and height. When I design a place setting, I always like to start with a charger or placemat. Then I add a dinner plate and salad plate. For this tablescape, I used a delicate woven placemat, then layered different coloured plates, tying them together with a textured napkin layer in between.
Candles are also a must for any tablescape. Whether they’re real or LED, it’s the shimmering essence that sets the ambience of the meal. On the woodland table, I mixed red votives into the centrepiece and added some small candlesticks (not shown) to provide different heights.
3. Mix & Match Colours and Patterns – For this tablescape I chose red as a feature colour. I used red dinner plates (plates from Pier 1) at each setting, as red is repeated throughout the house, tree and porch in my woodland theme. To not be matchy, I opted for a red and green plaid napkin that felt rustic, yet sophisticated due to the material. I love that the napkins have a frayed edge to soften their look. I continued to bring in the red colour motif through winterberry stems woven into the centrepiece, candle votives and individual poinsettia blooms. The blooms mimic the full poinsettia plants that are placed throughout the house, as part of the woodland scene.
4. Fresh Greens & Flowers – I always use fresh flowers and greens in my tablescapes. You want to wait until the day of or the night before if you are entertaining for brunch to add your greenery so it remains fresh. To keep with the winter woodland theme, I wanted to bring the outside in, so the centrepiece was created from natural branches and greens. I layered a combination of cedar, pine and eucalyptus branches beside and on top of each other, to create a full, yet loose runner that covered the length of the table. Not only do the varied natural green colours of the greenery look fresh, the smell adds to the feeling of being in a woodland. I also added in a few glittered pinecones and individual poinsettia blooms. Fresh red flowers are the perfect colour accent to all the green.
*Tip: I wrapped fresh rosemary around the base of every wine glass to form a wreath and used a different Christmas ribbon to tie the bow, keeping the wreath together. This is a great way for people to know which glass belongs to them. There is theme uniformity in the wreath, yet differentiation for each person in the ribbon colour or pattern.
5. Have Fun – To add an unexpected element to the tablescape and to further enhance the woodland theme, I added some reindeer and tree crystal wine glasses and glass woodland creature ornaments, including an owl and some squirrels. The glass-blown ornaments looked quite chic with gold toppers and flecks of metal throughout. The ornaments maintained the sophisticated feel of the other gold elements, without feeling too rustic. My guests loved looking for the animal ornaments hidden in the woodland.
I hope this helps give some ideas to create your own Winter Woodland Tablescape. I’d love to see any photos of your own tablescapes. You can post them in the comments below or post them at #mykuratedlife on Instagram!
Happy Holidays,
Krista
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