Christmas Florals | Holiday Dreams Come To Life In Nashville's Historic Cheekwood Mansion

Hi, Homeworthy. Welcome back to Cheekwood in Nashville. I'm Laura. Come on in. This Christmas, Homeworthy invites you into a season of wonder. Over the next 25 days, we're stepping into homes that sparkle with holiday cheer, where garlands tumble from mantles, ornaments hang like tiny treasures, and every corner comes alive with joy, merriment, and the spirit of the season. And I don't know how many ornaments are on the tree. Last year, I got 1,400 on, and they were made all over the world. There were ones made in America, Poland, Italy, Japan, just a wide variety, and I love them all. We'll visit homes where traditions are cherished, where beauty is made by hand, and where rituals become memories that last a lifetime. We make about 400 of these rolls every year, and on Christmas Eve, our family delivers them to certain families within the area, and our kids get to participate in choosing who gets them. From quiet moments by the fire to happy gatherings around the table, we're celebrating the way the holidays transform our spaces and fill them with magic. We do quite a dressy table because it's Christmas, and it's a party, and you want it to feel special, but you also, it's nice to make the table a little bit kind of imperfect, a little bit higgledy-piggledy. I want people to feel at a party in my home as if they're kind of wearing a ball gown but going barefoot, you know? It's that kind of high-low moment, that kind of specialness, but also the coziness of being really comfortable. So pour something warm, settle in, and join us for a season-long celebration of holiday magic. To watch Homeworthy's entire Christmas collection ad-free, visit homeworthyplus.com or scan the QR code on screen. You're watching Homeworthy, where we believe every home has a story. My name is Laura Dowling, and I'm a designer, author, and speaker. My design platform takes me all over the country, and in November, I spend time here in Nashville, Tennessee, decorating the Cheekwood Mansion. So the Cheekwood Mansion is this beautiful estate and botanical garden, 55 acres of an arboretum. It's an art museum. It was originally the home of Mabel and Leslie Cheek. The home was built in 1929 to 1932, and it really is one of the most beautiful examples of the English country house era. So as a designer, it's just been a wonderful experience to see the harmonious Georgian detail combined with classical elements, and I've tried to highlight in the decor throughout the mansion this year. My vision this year was to repurpose and reimagine all of the decor we used last year for the theme of Gifts of the Garden and translate it into a new theme that is based on nostalgia and evoking fond memories of the holidays. And so the theme is Sweet Dreams. Each room has a different version, maybe a reference to a song or movie. I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas, I'll Be Home for Christmas, The Nutcracker, all of these favorite songs, movies, things that we remember from childhood can be translated into the decor this year. So I think it's a fun theme. It also has a reference to Nashville. I wanted to give a sense of place so everyone will see a Dolly Parton room and even the Elvis Blue Christmas room. Welcome back to the Emerald Foyer. This is the start of the visitor tour and it's one of my favorite spaces. It's really a grand space, tall ceilings, but an intimate footprint. So this year the color scheme has totally changed the theme, evoking an emerald forest during the wintertime. The palette is all shades of green and gold. So the large tree, 14 feet tall, is built and constructed with hundreds of ornaments. I start with the shatterproof ornaments way on the inside and then build out in layers and levels to include these ball garlands that give a little bit of shape and dimension to the design. All of the trees in the mansion are faux trees because it's a museum. I think the trick when using a faux tree and the challenge is you want to create more of a natural profile. So while it's lovely to see branches in a live tree, a faux tree is not so nice. So that's why we feel like it's possible to create some opulent decor. In addition to the different colors of ornaments, I've mixed in some new ribbons this year that are really elegant with a motif of snowflakes and scrolls. The room itself has almost a sense of Tudor elegance. So I think the green is lovely not only as a color for the holidays, but coordinating with the antique tapestries, almost a 16th century feel. The tree is the main focal point and over here around the mantle there is another garland that is freestanding. We use the same base as last year. It's a freestanding metal piece that is built out with a little bit of chicken wire and mesh. The ornaments are added on in different layers too to create this whole effect that doesn't affect the historic fabric, but highlights this beautiful mantle. This year the flanking trees, we had topiaries last year, are larger in size, nine feet tall, and they're placed in emerald green urns. So the color translates throughout the space and over here this year we've incorporated a new space in the overall decor. It's called the niche hallway. It's a trellis design based on the song Holly and the Ivy. So flanked by here the faux boxwood with a trellis motif, very subtle draws your eye into the space that now is surrounded by all of these garlands that were meticulously measured and applied with small command hooks throughout the room. The main focal point as you enter the room will be this topiary with a ruched emerald green ribbon and gold ribbon and a little finial on top. So I hope this space will not only draw people in, I think it's a nice opportunity for friends and family to take photos here and does something to tie all the room room together. When I'm designing a space like this, I think about balance and editing. This year the garland is slightly more, I guess, subdued in a way, but carrying out the emerald green theme. I wanted to highlight the stair rail and the wonderful iron work on the stairway. So it's a green base garland with ribbon and an overlay of green velvet leaves that go up and lead your eye up the staircase with just a touch of gold baubles to keep it festive. So you have the focal point tree and then the backdrop is this more subtle garland in emerald green and colors of green and gold. So this is a 360 view of the tree. When people walk up the stairs, they'll be able to look and surround the tree and look at all the different elements from a different viewpoint. In this case, the finial on top, the design on top becomes really important. I use this boxwood topiary and you'll notice the trellis shape repeating the motif. I think that is such a fun thing to do when you're trying to tie design together and then the little finial on top. So everywhere people look, they'll be able to see something new and see a cohesive theme, hopefully. The last element in this space is the grand bouquet. Using faux flowers, because it's a museum and their incredible marble urn, we've created this lavish bouquet in shades of green with hydrangea and helleboras and a touch of gold to bring it all together. But I think it fills the space beautifully and again, flowers are so important as a finishing touch. This space is called the Transverse Hallway. It's now also shades of green and gold, but it has a totally different feeling. It's a woodlands theme this year. Last year, we just used simple topiaries. This year, I wanted to create actual trees and a muted emotion, a muted feeling to the room with these clever little woodland creatures, including stags and there's a red fox here, pomegranates and sparkle. The colors in here, the lighting is one of the darker spaces in the mansion, but by adding the fairy lights, adding sparkle and this color palette, I think it brightens it up and creates just a fun transition space for people to walk through and find little whimsical touches. So your eye goes down the hall. We have different kinds of trees. We have the fully decorated Christmas trees and then these grapevine trees that are just wrapped in pinecone garlands and berries with a touch of ribbon and a finial to create some symmetry and keep leading the eye down towards the end of the hall. One of the fun features we have this year is this Belgian Pigeonaire. So it's a bird cage and an unusual shape, I think, but my friend Robbie Honey from South Africa has created this little vignette of birds with branches escaping and I think it's right at eye level for children and they'll be able to look inside and see acorns and birds and quite whimsical. Well, what started out as a prank by one of my designers adding bears to the climbing the tree here became a cute touch, I think, at the end. You'll see two bears on the topiary trees with a holiday scarf just wrapped in gold and some pinecone touches. So at the end of the hallway you start to get the feeling that there are some fun whimsical things to the decor. Then your eye comes down to this space. So we've reimagined a lot of things from last year's design in the different spaces. In the Loggia last year we had four topiary, I think it was actually eight topiary lemon trees surrounding the room. Four of them have been gathered in each large urn just to create that, I would call it a palette cleanser in the design, so that as people transition through the space it gives them something to look at and also appreciate every space in the mansion. This is an octagon room with one of the most valuable pieces, the mirror here in the in this room, and it leads you then to the most magnificent room in the mansion. Welcome to the drawing room. This is the hard candy Christmas design based on the Dolly Parton song. So I took the theme from last year, the color scheme was much richer, aqua and fuchsia, and softened it a bit, still based on the colors of the room, the carpet and the draperies, but it's a more pastel palette with some fun features this year. The bonbon candy, 200 macaroons that are tucked in so people can look at it and see the candy, there's a taffy ornament, so a base of a theme with the candy and then adding in the colorful ornaments. There are at least a thousand, probably 1,500 ornaments on this tree, including glittering birds and butterflies. Butterfly is one of Dolly's favorite motifs, so we took the butterflies and put them on wires and you'll see at the top of the tree that they're flying out of the top. So it gives people something to look at when they come into the room. A 16-foot tree with 20-foot ceilings, I think it's important to have the design go from eye level to something that is a focal point at the top. What people will notice when they come in is the depth of the design. For this tree especially, it was important to go in with ornaments and base the tree with the reflective ornaments near the trunk. The Cheekwood team added an additional 2,500 lights this year so that the whole effect would be a little more illuminated and bright. When you add on that many ornaments, sometimes it can be really dark on the edges. So we started building and constructing the tree from the bottom up with the base layer and then adding all the middle layers and levels until we came to the outside edges. So the outside edges have the smallest elements that extend beyond the profile of the tree. One thing I wanted to point out, if you have a faux tree or any tree where you want to make it look a little more natural, we took an old tree this year, cut out the branches, and actually added them onto the base of the tree here. So it extends the profile. It really is important to create a more natural effect. I think when people look at the tree this year, hopefully they'll see the whimsy, the playfulness, the motion, the in and out movement of the design that is very playful and fun. So a bit of a surprise here in the dining room with the big tree this year. The tree is complemented by the mantel design. Again, just like the stairway garland, I wanted to do something a little more subtle and use it as a backdrop and a complement to the main tree. So the fireplace garland is supported by two 15-pound barbells. This is a great trick when you don't want to attach things to historic fabric or, in this case, it's stone. The barbells sit on top. The garland goes around the mantel and will support even heavy decoration like these balls and ribbons. The whole design is grounded by the bonbon candies at the base. So the pastel color scheme, all of the decor is designed for people to think of. Dolly Parton, her hard candy Christmas song, and the soundtrack will actually be playing when people tour the mansion this year. One of the new features in the room to give this more homey, intimate feeling of the whole Sweet Dreams theme, the wreaths that are in the windows. So I've made four wreaths that complement the design, are hung in these incredible windows that will draw people's eye to the windows and overall create some more warmth in the design. The main tree is flanked by these two gold trees that also have the same color palette and the macaroons and taffies added in for the candy theme. Here's a vignette of this beautiful Chinese porcelain pot that the pear table and this magnificent cheek family painting, it just requires a big flower arrangement. So since everything needs to be faux, I really recommend using high quality faux flowers when decorating in such a prominent place and then crafting them in a way where it almost looks natural. So these feel natural, they look natural, and they're constructed with dry foam as the base, some faux garland as a base, and then they're built in a very natural way with some movement in the color scheme that goes with everything else here. On this side of the tree too, hopefully people will be encouraged to look deep inside. This is the one tree where you can come up close and see the depth and see how the design team has put this together. I was up high myself on the 18-foot ladder decorating at the very top, but you'll see all of the ribbon detail too. When using this variety of color and ribbon, the whole idea was to have a multi-color bonbon effect, but I tried to tie it together and do this with a few finishing touches. So this is just simple twirling ribbon that you can buy at any store. I used it in all the different colors to just add that final finishing touch. So while many of the trees in the mansion this year have about six to eight layers of design, this tree probably has 10 to 12, including all of these finishing touches and glitter birds and butterflies. Every time I come to this room, actually any room in the mansion, I'm always struck by new features, and standing right here you can look in that incredible mirror over on the side and see the reflection of the tree and different highlights, the eagle above the fireplace. So a room like this is really grand in proportion, and by extending the decor around the room, I think it helps to highlight all of the features that people will enjoy looking at when they visit this year. There's always a challenge with the budget and constrains the time. You know, it's a big installation. We had about 22 trees this year, many more wreaths, so many more elements of decor. So the challenge is timing, logistics, budget, but we were able to compensate for that work around it by introducing a lot of different craft elements this year. So you'll see some handmade touches that are really wonderful. We also reached out to friends around the country and were able to receive donations, an incredible donation of faux flowers that we've used throughout the mansion, and also some decor with whimsical touches that will integrate into the design this year. Welcome to the library. This might be one of my favorite rooms on the tour this year, and I hear other people saying that too. Last year we used a citrus theme in the loggia. It was very vivid and bright, the lime, the lemon, the orange, but I had this sense that this library, the coziest room at Cheekwood, might really be enhanced with that color scheme. And the way I used that color scheme was to add colors like copper and bronze and this mossy green. So instead of a really vivid and bright citrus theme, it's a little more muted and warmer, and what I think it does, it seems to almost bring the the orange tones out of the incredible wood paneling that's here in the library. So there are two trees, again a pair of trees, that are fruit based. The way we made these was to take the fruit branches as the first element and add them into the tree. It creates just this softer line and profile, and then the base layer of the shatterproof ornaments added in, as always, to bounce the light back to the outside edge. The ball garlands mimic the fruit and give the additional movement and bounce, and then just adding more and more ornaments in the palette. So you'll notice this tree doesn't have ribbon. We didn't think it needed ribbon, but if you turn and look over here at the mantelpiece, this is where we did a grand display this year. Last year, using command hooks to support a smaller garland, and we're so cognizant of this is a museum, there's historic fabric. The way we created the garland this year, it's actually two stanchions with PVC pipe going up 88 inches, and then that will support the garland and the festoon in the middle. I was inspired by the architecture above the mantel with the clock and the carving, and thought that this space, this mantel, and balancing the trees really needed something significant. So this garland has a lot of ribbon, more ornaments, and then the festoon of fruit and touches of sparkle on it as well. When you come in this room, I think everyone's first instinct is to pull up a chair by the fire, and so we did that this year with a table setting, using the actual collection of chic furniture and these incredible tapestry chairs. The table settings are from Replacements Limited. Just like last year, they've been an incredible partner for us in sending this mix of plates and vintage china that pulls the whole scene together. For a centerpiece, instead of, you know, again, lavish, I'm thinking about balance. Just a simple boxwood ball with fruit and touches of sparkle are enough, and it keeps the eye moving to the mantel garland, which is another focal point piece. On the table, one of the pieces I really love is this claret Art Nouveau piece on loan from Replacements that tie in the napkins. Just a simple find from Crate and Barrel and enhanced with the fruit and gold motif. Adding little touches like that around the room can tie the whole scheme together. In the windows this year, just like many of the other rooms, we've added wreaths, fruit wreath on the standalone window, and then a pair of ribbon wreaths. So these are just grapevine wreaths that are based in yellow ribbon with gilded leaves and a touch of sparkle to tie and kind of create a cohesive theme in this room. So one of my favorites, I think the colors, the mood is really warm and carries out that theme of being home for the holidays. This is the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies theme, and the room reimagined in pastel colors with snowflakes and fanciful design. The color scheme is lilac, pink, and plum with snowflakes surrounding and touches of winter wonderland idea. So the lavender tree is one of my favorites. These balls, there are some handmade touches. These are tissue paper balls that were made just by crumpling up craft paper, wrapping it in plastic, and then masking tape. A little paint with hundreds of tissue paper squares painstakingly glued onto the form and glittered. I think it adds this wonderful homemade touch, a warmth, and just a light-hearted touch to this tree. So all of the ornaments are in this plum and lavender shade. Another fabric or another element I use in addition to these really elegant ribbons, I wanted to emphasize the color. So this is plastic table sheeting that comes in rolls and made into swags, and I think when you combine it with the more elegant pieces, you get the sense of color and depth but don't actually know that it is very inexpensive material. So I think it's a good thing when you're trying to use it with with a specific color scheme. The main tree is this live poinsettia tree. It's an iconic feature at Cheekwood. Every year I think there are over 450 live poinsettias in variegated pink and cream and pink. So when the horticulturalist built this tree, 16 feet tall, there's a frame underneath with an irrigation system. My designers went up and I climbed it as well. This frame that goes all the way to the top, and at the top of the tree, the finishing touch starts first. The white owl, the glitter owl, that seems to be looking at people when you come in the door. So it starts from the top down and we added the different baubles and ribbons. Here are more of the tissue paper balls that add that softness and sense of ethereal dance of the sugar plum fairy theme. It finishes off at the bottom. These white poinsettia ornaments can just be picked into the design. So using the motif of an ornamental poinsettia with a live poinsettia, I think, brings the whole look together. So this is the focal point and then flanked on the other side with the plum version of the tree in this color palette is fun. The plastic sheeting, the elegant ribbons, the owls at the top. This year we used about six and a half miles of fairy lights to add the sparkle to all of the trees and I think it gives a wonderful effect, especially at night. So the light will change throughout the day here and it's fun to see all of the designs at different times of the day. It was important to create the snowflakes. You might remember from last year we had the citrus geometric wreaths in the window. This year they've been reimagined as giant snowflakes. It was a major volunteer project with crafting. We called it studio sessions where 10 to 12 volunteers every day would come over and, working with simple craft paper, make individual florets. There are 10,000 in each wreath and then these were wired into garlands and applied to the wreath form. So this was a monumental project as you might imagine. It took over two weeks to do it. We started in early October and the finishing touch was to hand glitter each of the florets, add the baubles, and then make it a little more ethereal with the branches, the silver and gold branches surrounding it. So it's really fun to see the volunteers and many of them are docents leading a tour and they actually know exactly which floret, which section they made of the wreath. So I love incorporating these kinds of projects, something I did at the White House. The large geometric wreaths are flanked on the other side of the wall with complementary snowflake designs made with snowball garlands, with winter branches, crystal branches, and I love the idea of how it ties this side of the room with that side of the room. People can walk throughout the space and see touches including these gilded stags that draw your eye to the next space and another touch, the flowers in the room. So in the giant urns flanking the door, we've got an arrangement of winter flowers in the lilac, purple, and pink palette. The whole room ties together, I think, with this ethereal feeling and a unique color scheme that hopefully will inspire people this year. When I think about a favorite place, it really is difficult to choose and I think I need a little bit more time away from the project. We literally just finished decorating, but I would say I have a few favorite elements. I love the emerald and gold tree in the entrance foyer. I love the Dolly Parton tree with the candy elements. I think the morning room where I'm sitting now is a must-see because when people come through and the theme is, "'Twas the Night Before Christmas," I hope that it will evoke just the emotion of the holidays, the warmth, that feeling of gathering around the table. So it has the colors of red, green, and gold with fruit touches, dried oranges, so I think it's very nostalgic and might be one of my favorites this year. Here we are in the dining room of the Cheekwood Mansion, the most colorful room in terms of decor. So you might remember last year I did a medium blue and pink color scheme. This year I played with the color palette and chose aqua and peach. Now the peach is a color that's in the center part of the wall, and I feel like the flowers, the colors draw out that color, complement the room, and so it's really a play on color and palette to create the feeling in here of a grand holiday table. So we've got the two trees that have a lot of flowers in them. This was a wonderful donation, and the construction of the trees, the design of the trees starts with putting the branches in place, including some gilded branches for a natural touch, and then the ornaments are repurposed from last year with all of the peach decor, the aqua going to this design. So the two trees are flanking the table with some flower arrangements, peach roses drawing your eye back here, and this wonderful art piece on loan from Replacements is an Art Nouveau vase with with a tray. So I love how when people will walk into the room they'll see the table and then beyond it have another layer to look at. The table is one of my favorites this year with the aqua, with the gold. Maybe a little simpler than last year, but still I think a pretty grand design. The napkins are just simple with a gold edge and a little bit of lace embellished with the ribbon that's tied to make it festive, and then we used an ornament, a wreath ornament and crystal that is also used on the tree. So it's a touch of the Versace china in the color palette, setting the the tone in the room. The mantel garland is designed to highlight all of the beautiful detail on this blue lapis mantle and the carvings. Here again we use 15 pound barbells to ground the design and layer the ornaments of ribbons to just create a simple swag effect across the top of the garland. The cloisonne vases are part of the Cheekwood Collection. They usually are based down in the entrance foyer, but because of the turquoise color I thought they would be perfect in this room. So from this angle you see the trees, you see the all of the flowers surrounding the table, and then we've added the wreaths in the window from last year, except this year we stripped them down to just the gold leaves with an embellishment of ribbon on top. I think the goal with a tree like this is it's a nine foot tree and new this year, it's a faux tree, is not only to build from the outside, creating this outside layer, creating the base layer, but to add all of the finishing touches of crystal and detail with the flowers. One tip if you want to change ornaments up, these are usually finials that hang down with the point, but by having them stand on the tree branch it creates a different look, maybe slightly more regal in effect. So all in all this is a colorful room with the color palette really taking cues from the existing decor and the painting, the wall colors in the room. Well we're in the Blue Christmas Room, the tree that's based on the Elvis Presley song wanted to do something a little surprising, a little bright, it's turquoise that came from different places last year in the mansion decor, but all of the purple and blue balls, these turquoise elements, I think work really well on the silver tree with some silver branches. This is a small room that people should stop and look and look at the Cheek family collection of silver in China, so the theme of the Blue Christmas Room to complement the blue walls, the silver in the room, and then incorporate the Elvis Presley song, the soundtrack will be playing a lot of favorites, including Blue Christmas, and I hope that it will make people smile, maybe give them a sense of a different color palette, how to make it festive. I think the turquoise really brightens up the space and does highlight the collection in the room, so people will be passing through this room before they enter into the grand finale, the main room at the end of the tour with a holiday feeling. I started working in flowers, it was a spark of inspiration when I went to Paris around 2000. I was so inspired by the style of design, the French touch, and I studied flowers in Paris for many years, and working as a part-time florist out of my kitchen, my husband encouraged me to apply for the White House Chief Floral Design position, which I didn't think would be possible. You don't think having basically a hobby or small side business could lead to that kind of position, but I entered the competition and went through rounds of cuts and interviews and ended up being selected to be the Chief Floral Designer at the White House from 2009 to 2015. It was an incredible experience where I really did learn how to decorate on a grand scale, not just for the holidays but for state dinners, for major events throughout the year at the White House, and so since then I've been writing books and talking about and sharing my experience with groups all over the country, and also trying to do special projects like the one here at Cheekwood to bring the happiness, joy, inspiration to people wherever I go. We're in the morning room that the theme is, "'Twas the Night Before Christmas." When people are on the Cheekwood tour this year, they will see a lot of color, a lot of whimsical themes, so I felt it was important to create a space, have a space that was full of nostalgia in classic holiday colors, red, green, and gold, with some elements like fruit, things that people might remember from childhood, drying oranges, making orange clove features, so it's fruit, it's the color, it's the overall feeling of the space. Last year it was totally different. It was a winter wonderland theme, so this year more to evoke that feeling of the night before Christmas, the excitement. There's a table setting that we incorporated with the Versace Christmas china, a Tiffany base plate, all in this cranberry, you know, red shade, complimentary, with simple napkins, a very simple little design with just the complimentary ribbon that goes on the tree, the plaid tartan, tied in back with floral wire, creates just that element of softness on the table and highlights some of the beautiful pieces in the coffee service. The center point tree in the design is this fruit and flower and shiny Christmas ball motif, red, green, and gold with the fruit branches, and I love how the tartan plaid just plays into that very nostalgic, very traditional. So you'll notice from a design point that the trees are flanked by slightly fancier trees. They're in gold, they have more, I would say, elegant ribbons, the velvet, the gold trim, still in the same color palette but a little more upgraded with, in terms of the ribbon that we've used, I think what they do is they highlight the tree and set off the center, the center point place. So the whole composition is designed to create this nostalgic feeling, a sense of being home for the holidays, and I hope will be very inviting. There's a The big wreath on the mirror is held up by a command hook, and you can use these. It's a very good technique when you don't have a place to hang. This is actually quite lightweight, but you can get heavier weight command hooks to hold the weight of the design. This garland has the barbells behind it, and so it will be supported all season. I think creating these additional lines of garlands creates this fun effect and very natural. So one of my favorite places on the tour that people will see before they leave and exit through the hallway that has another surprise. So my latest book, I actually pre-released it last year here at Cheekwood, Designing Christmas, was designed to bring it all together. I wanted to not only talk about my White House experience, but give people tips and tricks for how to decorate at home. So it starts with just the background on the creative process, the step-by-step of how to think about a theme, how to break it down into color schemes, and then information about logistics. And then I talk about 10 of my favorite creative elements to use in a holiday design scheme, from the trees to the garland to the table centerpieces. And then a fun part of the book, I identified 10 different creative themes that people can interpret and use in their own way. So it's been really fun to be out on tour with the book, and yes, here again at Cheekwood, Designing Christmas. Welcome to the Grand Staircase. This is the last space on the tour. Last year it was a winter garden, natural plants and things, but looking at the space, thinking about all of the amazing flowers that we had on hand that we could use, I thought it would be fun, really fun, to design a tree that was quite vivid. I think it's a French-inspired color scheme, red and fuchsia, of this tree as a focal point with the staircase garland behind it, and then two magnificent flower arrangements that will tie everything together. So the red tree started with these bougainvillea branches and red and fuchsia ornaments that we gathered from around the inventory we used last year. The ball garlands give the sense of movement and balance. I think it's a design scheme that works well in a darker space, but will add the color and brightness. Because it's tall, it draws your eye up to this art piece chandelier, the gold staircase chandelier, and when you look up you just see the stairway garland going all the way to the top. So the tip for constructing things this year, the stairway garland is just a simple greenery base that goes all the way up, and then the next layer are these bougainvillea branches tied into the garland. I've talked about some of the craft projects that are on the tour using this paper. It's craft paper made into larger florets into a garland. You can see it woven here, creating more dimension and movement with the ribbons added as a finishing touch. So all of those things together create something that is actually very simple elements that creates a sense of opulence when you use it together. The simple things, the paper with the collection of gold leaves and baubles, and then the flowers. So it's a lot of bougainvillea. It was a wonderful donation, and something like that can create the basis for your overall design scheme. Just a note about how I incorporate ribbon into trees like this. I rarely use bows tied in a typical way. The bows are wired into a single loop, and then just the tails are designed to fling out and create another edge, another profile to the design. I think it's important to avoid having a flat stretch of ribbon across the tree. If you cut them into pieces and have them evoke the similar flow as the line you've established with flowers or with baubles, it will create a lot more movement and interest, I think. The flower arrangements include both the bougainvillea, the faux peonies, and the gloriosa lilies. So the design technique here is to use the dry floral foam, base it in with the largest flowers, create the line with the bougainvillea, have a few things that are escaping here, and these incredible, you know, the gloriosa lily flying out the top. So working with scale and the place, it will actually tie then into the the pier tables here and showcase the mirror and the other exciting beautiful elements in the room. So I think this will be a fun place for people to see color and then go back down through the emerald hallway as they go outside to see the holiday lights. I really view flowers as the jewelry and the special touch during the holidays, but even throughout the year. Flowers add that sense of warmth and nature during the holiday season. The scent of pine, the scent of paper whites, all of these things can be incorporated along with other scents. The orange, the clove, apple cinnamon, I think these are the things that really make the holidays special and translate into memories that we all have from childhood. So flowers are the finishing touch, but I love the whole and entire scheme of holiday decor, from bringing greenery, fresh greenery, into the house, decorating the trees, the garlands, the wreaths. This year at Cheekwood, I really tried to expand the decor elements we used last year to include everything. So you'll see many more wreaths and garlands, as well as many more flower arrangements. So definitely flower arrangements are the finishing touch. Homeworthy, thank you so much for coming back to Cheekwood. I hope you have a great holiday season and a very happy new year. Thanks for watching. Be sure to go to homeworthy.com for exclusive content, shopping guides, and so much more.