A popular interior design creator whose Christmas trends regularly go viral has shared her top tips for creating the ultimate DIY cozy Christmas decor aesthetic.
Emily Welch, from Omaha, Nebraska, has racked up more than 700,000 followers across her social media channels @emilywelchstyle, with viewers loving her holiday decorating and DIY tips.
During the festive period, Emily, a self-described Christmas obsessive, shared her advice with Happily so followers can achieve the perfect cozy Christmas decor – which she started working on as soon as her calendar hit November 1.
Check out our video with Emily then read her top tips below!
Tip #1: Lots of lights!
“A big part of Cozy are lights. Like twinkle lights, or I really like tapered candles.” And especially flameless candles. “I really like how it looks at night like from the outside of your house, but it also just adds some extra like ambience of the flickering candle without it being a fire hazard.”
Tip #2: Keep the colors classic!
As a child of the 90s, she recommends using the likes of reds and burgundies where possible, creating a warm, cozy feeling of nostalgia that wouldn’t look out of place in a Home Alone or Nancy Meyers movie.
“Don’t mess with Christmas, you know, keep it to your red and green and burgundy and gold! This year, we moved into our 100-year-old home and I felt like it really deserved that like classic 90s Christmas. It’s just that vibe that makes people feel cozy because it brings back childhood memories and nostalgia for them.”
Tip #3: Add different textures
When it comes to textures, Emily says the likes of velvets and wools will always be associated with a cozy Christmas – as are twinkle lights.
“Like adding in knits and velvet and metal and making sure you’re mixing those textures to create like a cozy vibe, especially knits and velvets.”
Tip #4: Faux greenery everywhere!
Emily says Christmas lovers should add the likes of mini wreaths on their cabinets, place garlands in their doors and windows, and to share festive treats that make a home feel extremely seasonal and cozy.
“Like wreaths on my cabinet doors. I just use little command hooks to stick them to the cabinet doors and then add some velvet.” And especially… garlands! “People just add them everywhere and honestly, I am people. I also add them everywhere. It really adds so much of a punch. I also like to add faux garlands over my windows, like on the curtain rod. I just drape it on the curtain rod. You don’t even need anything else.”
And a bonus tip for garlands galore…
“Use a tension shower curtain rod and put it through like a doorway so you don’t have to use any kind of hook or damage your wall. And then you can drape garlands and decor twisted around it and it just makes the doorway look really pretty and cozy.”
Tip #5: DIY decor
Emily encourages anyone to try DIY, big or small, with little things such as paper garlands and homemade bows being a simple but effective starting point.
“I feel [paper garlands] are really nostalgic. It’s just you cut strips of paper and you make like a paper chain. And that’s like, it’s so easy, and I think it’s relaxing because you’re just doing the same thing over and over. So, I feel like it’s also like a little bit of therapy.”
Tip #6: More is more!
Emily feels you can never have enough festive ornaments for Christmas – a collection which she said can be built up over the years, so people can always have a burst of nostalgia when they take them out of storage each festive season.
“You can never have enough ornaments, but I really like to mix in different colors and different textures. Like I have some paper ornaments, I have velvet and then metals. And then I have some little glass ornaments – I really love the vintage glass ornaments. They’re like a Santa or like a hot dog or something, those are really cute too.”
Tip #7: Curate your decor over time for cost-effectiveness
“People are always like, how do I get to this amount of decor or how do I do this on a budget? And I feel like it’s not something most people are doing in a year. Just take your time with it and go to thrift stores or at the end of the season, buy what you think you’re going to want next year when it’s on sale. And just start accumulating it over the years and you’ll get there.”
Tip #8: Decorate early for extra end-of-year happiness
“I’ve always loved Christmas. I would have a little Christmas tree in my room or I would beg my mom to let us put up our Christmas decorations early. And she was always the wait-until-after-Thanksgiving person. So I feel like now that I am an adult and I can do whatever I want, November 1st is right when I go crazy for Christmas. And I feel like a lot of people have too, just because they need something in this world to, you know, bring that extra bit of happy. And that’s all we want. And that makes them happy. And it makes me happy.”