Now that we have a John Lewis in Exeter, I’ve been lusting after many of their gorgeous Christmas decorations. I was very lucky to be invited into the store for a private masterclass on Decorating the Christmas Tree, and Preparing the Festive Table. Tamsin and Jo from the Visual Merchandising team were on hand to give the the lowdown on how to have a perfect display this Christmas.

First we dressed a Christmas Tree in their ‘Lapland‘ Childrens theme. This range is gorgeous and fun for the children, with its oversize baubles, felt animals and bright colours. We talked about how to approach the tree to make sure you get an spread of colour (put all the same type of decoration on at once, so you can see that they are spread out and you don’t have 2 decorations the same too close). We also talked about the benefit of artificial trees as you can manipulate the branches to fill in gaps and hold ornaments in place. We also talked about putting the lights on the tree, but this is a job I hate so luckily my tree at home is pre-lit!

I fell in love with some of the decorations and couldn’t leave the shop with out buying these wool ball decorations and these gorgeous boiled wool baubles too! These are perfect for adding to the bottom of the tree where pesky toddlers like to play with the decorations as they are perfectly safe and can’t break!

The tips on picking a theme or colour for your decorations were good, and although our tree at home remains a mishmash of things we have collected over the years, I was a little bit more careful in my selection of what went on the tree this year.

Then we moved onto the table. I was really interested in this, as this year we are hosting our very first Christmas at home, and I wanted it to be special! The theme I was shown was a beautiful, quite formal Winter Wonderland inspired theme. It was absolutely beautiful and although my table won’t look similar, I was inspired to take a theme and run with it. So my table will have a green and red Holly and Ivy theme. I’ll also be giving thought to how the table is laid out and adding little favour boxes to each place setting, again inspired by what Tamsin and Jo showed me!

My favourite touch was a wreath which had been laid flat on the table with a candle in the middle, which made a gorgeous centrepiece. Always be open to using things in a different way, just because its sold as a wreath doesn’t mean it has to be hung up!

I’ll be back to show you what my Christmas Tree and Table end up looking like Thanks very much to John Lewis Exeter for taking the time to show me these great hints and tips.