Simply Beautiful Holiday Mantel

When it comes to holiday decorating, if you have a fireplace mantel in your home, do you start with the mantel or is it one of the last things you decorate? When I’m planning out my holiday decor for the season, I always seem to think about the mantel and the tree first and everything else seems to fall into place. Since the fireplace in our living room is a focal point in the room, I always like to start there. While it can be daunting to know where to begin, I’m going to walk you through my Simply Beautiful Holiday Mantel and show you how easy it can be!

Anchor Piece

Before I begin decorating my mantel for a new season I always like to remove everything and start with a clean slate.  It’s always good to have an anchor or statement piece to draw your eye in and base the rest of your design around.  After a lot of searching, I purchased this mirror in the fall and knew come Christmas it would really shine here! Mirrors and oversized art make great anchor pieces that can be used year-round on your mantel. To see how I used oversized art as my anchor piece last year, check out my Warm and Elegant Holiday Mantel

Garland

Fresh or faux, that is the question!?! I’ve used fresh garland on the mantel before, but sadly it only looks great for about a week and then it makes a terrible mess. There are so many realistic looking faux garland options out there, and once you’re done, it looks great all season long.  I chose this faux garland because it had a very simple look with only a few subtle gold embellishments.  For the most realistic look, choose something simple that would resemble a fresh garland and add subtle accessories like I did with the brass bells and ribbon.

Stockings

Stockings are such a fun accessory for your holiday mantel.  There are endless options out there from knitted to linen to faux fur to velvet.  You can switch them up from year to year or invest in something neutral and use them over and over.  Last year I purchased these handmade white velvet stockings and I just added blue ribbon to update them for this year’s Christmas.

Candles

Candles are a mantel must-have in my opinion, especially at Christmas! There’s something so magical about the glow of the tree, the fire and flickering candle light on Christmas nights. In keeping with my simply beautiful holiday mantel, I added soft blue taper candles in vintage brass candlestick holders on one side of the mirror and on the other side I added mismatched votive candle holders that I already had on hand.  I always try to use what I have on hand first, it doesn’t get any easier than that!

I hope you found my tips for creating a simply beautiful holiday mantel helpful. Sometimes it’s hard to know where to begin, but breaking down the separate elements and using what you already have on hand is a good place to start. What are you adding to your holiday mantel? For my friends who don’t have a fireplace mantel to decorate, no problem! All of these tips can be applied to a sideboard, tv console or shelving unit.

I’ve got one more post planned before Christmas and it involves something sweet.  Hope you’ll join me!

Judy Xx