House & Garden Christmas Decor Tours I’m obsessed with these Christmas decor house tours from House and Garden. I adore how they do Christmas in the UK — the approach is very more is more, and with so many old, smaller spaces everything just feels so cozy! Not all are in the UK, this one is in Sweden — but how dreamy???

Festive Holiday Accessories I’ve seen a lot of great advice this year on how to dress for the holidays without feeling like you have to invest a lot in things you’ll only wear this month. A few highlights:

Leandra Medine Cohen
highlighted tights as a “whimsical game changer”
On Fashion People,
Allison Bornstein
encouraged adding festiveness via accessories:

I always ask: what would you wear if this was a normal cocktail party? and what can we add to that to maybe add a little bit of festiveness? Is it some fun accessories? Is it a shoe that you might wear again?…Because I feel like a lot of times we’ll get really costumey in the holiday dressing and then you’re like, I’ll never wear this again.

Speaking of fun accessories — I adored
Camilla
’s newsletter about Diana Vreeland’s “Why Don’t You” column, which included “why don’t you tie black tulle bows on your wrists?” Honestly? Brilliant. I ordered a copy of the book immediately after reading Camilla’s newsletter and the whole thing is a delight.

Tulipieres I recently learned about tulipieres, so naturally I’m spotting them everywhere now. For the unacquainted, tulipieres “are ornate ceramic pieces featuring several different spouts that hold blooms (traditionally tulips) individually, all while each stem rests in the same shared water bowl.” (thanks, Martha!) They’re so fun and unique — now I’m on the lookout for interesting ones wherever I go.

Candle Racks Like tulipieres, candle racks have also nestled into a permanent place in my brain. It started with

jessie randall

‘s newsletter, which revealed that she has a candle rack in her kitchen (immediately added one to my imaginary dream kitchen). Then, I came across the candle wall at Wentworth’s in Charleston earlier this month. As I’m sending this on the shortest, darkest day of the year, what more could you wish for?

Vintage Ornaments My friend Anne recently inspired me to think more about vintage Christmas ornaments. There’s a big vintage market here and they’re all over the place — colorful glass balls by the box, as well as more unique and decoratives ones. They’re charming and so reasonably priced. Of course, you can also find them in abundance on Etsy. Anne includes them with hostess gifts and adds them to her holiday place settings. I love the idea of attaching them to bottles of this homemade irish cream (which I finally made last year — it was so easy and so delicious), and handing them out as little Christmas treats.

I’m signing off for a few weeks. Happy Holidays!!! ❣️

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