Christmas Decorating Ideas from the 1910s and 1920s

[@bluemercy297]

I love what your wearing👍👍👍thanks for oldies decor. I like lots 👍

[@Pour_La_Victoire]

I love the idea of cones filled with candies! My father remembers fondly how chocolates were held up with strings and ribbons onto the Christmas decorations of his youth... this was in 1970s Portugal and it was a rare treat to get candy!

[@06BIBOI]

Your random ramblings might be what truly makes this channel awesome lol !

[@wildchildlikeu]

I love the ensemble you're wearing. And I love the tid bits you share about days gone by.🎄

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Thanks :)

[@johnl1685]

You're the best. Your appreciation for past things is wonderful. Rare indeed. Marry me. HA!!

[@tillyok183]

So happy I found your channel! You seem like a lovely person 💜

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Aw, thank you :)

[@johnl1685]

I just found your channel. Yes. You are a kindred soul. Old stuff and old ways are the best! . In my apartment there isn't a single thing you can touch that isn't from the old days. If it's new I don't want it. Ha!

[@susanstage9279]

My father was born in 1922. He went through the Depression. Those times were very harsh! Anyway love vintage Christmas decor!

[@Mrs.AD0099]

Aww that story abt your grandma and the candy canes is priceless! Merry Christmas!!

[@imjustanotherjess]

So pleased that I’ve stumbled across your channel, your videos seem to align perfectly with my interests! It’s lovely to know that other people love to research into things as niche as 1910s and 20s Christmas decorations. Just subscribed ❤️❤️

[@SandyzSerious]

My favorite Christmas video. It's wonderful. You look beautiful also.

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Thank you! 😊

[@TheGabygael]

Your mini people scenery is adorable, it looks like they are skating in a cloudy sky, in a fog, in a snow storm or in an avalanche

[@christisnow1309]

I'm so pleased to have found your channel. How descriptive and wonderful. This is my favorite time period, my house is decorated as such. I can't wait to check out your other videos!

[@rosemarythyme6351]

As we live in a 1910 home, I wondered what Christmas décor was like over a century ago. Thanks for the info and illustrations of the Edwardian era!

[@lenorebjork2763]

So Wonderfull! Thank you so much!

[@hollywoodharriet13]

Interesting and some great ideas for the holiday table! Thanks.

[@sherry.4351]

the candy cones were so cute, I've never made a Christmas center peice before,but this year will be the year.

[@StephanieCanada]

I love the Christmas things!! I actually have some 1890’s Cosmopolitan’s and other 1910-1930’s magazines I am looking to find a new home for. Would you want them?

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

I would certainly be interested in them! Antique magazines are kind of my weakness 😅 I have a whole Ikea drawer system dedicated to keeping mine safe and all organized by year (in archival magazine bags of course!).

[@ccruse1777]

LOVE your outfit!! :)

[@susanstage9279]

Just occurred to me about five minutes ago. I just picked up a book from an antique store for three dollars. So darn cute, a children’s book about Christmas and after. By David Cory titled Little Jack Rabbit and Mr Wicked Wolf, dated 1923. I have picked up books dated early 1900’s to late 1920’s centered around Christmas holidays. Nothing about decor. All about feels of love, gratitude, friendship and family, and the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ! Merry Christmas!

[@TUBEWALKER100]

Its only August and im watching this haha, great video, been going through your videos, be cool to see one of you amazing pad/collection. keep on collecting.

[@TheGabygael]

In the gazette du bon ton they say that they mimic a snowy scene by putting a white table cloth, an oval-shaped mirror and white statuettes as well as a "snow covered orange tree" dont know if it was the type of decoration you could buy (like the branches covered in fake snow we find nowadays) or, like i understand it, and actual small orange tree covered in real snow (maybe the fact that it's on a tree makes it harder to melt? Or rooms were cooler back then that they are now? Or maybe it would have to be refrigerated and put on the table at the last minute and put out as soon as it became too warm? )

[@TheGabygael]

I love how they used the meal to further the idea of the decoration: most of the food around the main turkey is white and shiny and they serve "mont blanc" as a dessert

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Thanks for the translation! I really wish they had been more specific. Real snow sounds so pretty but melting must have been an issue... Maybe if it was only on the tops of the trees, the base would catch any of the drips?

[@tegansutherland7299]

Always love a good Bettina table setting! Also i am really intrigued by those directions to make an evergreen garland. Im going to have to try that at some point!

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Bettina had great table settings :)

[@Heatherhudginsrealtor]

Wow love this

[@MrGegeca1]

Omg!! Just found your channel and now that the 20's are a new obsession of mine, I just hope you always keep posting 💕 great finding in such a chaotic year. Love the christmas deco :)

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Thank you :)

[@nartyteek]

The room that was meant to be a laundry room I have packed with Halloween decor. Some of it was biodegradable this year since it was old blackberry vines, but that room is done for. It belongs to the holiday tchotchkes now. It's a bit weird this year since I haven't been to a party obviously, but that's why I like the holiday videos so much.

[@ladycroftbayonetta7908]

incredible ideas also i would like to ask you where can i find this magazine you showed i live in Greece

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Which one? Any of the digital resources are linked in the video description, some of which are magazines. The physical magazine I flipped through near the end is an antique, and isn't available anywhere as far as I know (it's a somewhat rare issue).

[@ladycroftbayonetta7908]

@@TheLongHairedFlapper thanks dear i will search for it

[@professionaldilettante1815]

It is always such a pity that, with the research and fun personality of yours, your videos do not get the amount of views they deserve. I hope things will change in 2021!

[@shannonc.5837]

8:07 I speak French so I checked the book and and I’m pretty sure they didn’t specify what was used for the snow! But I could be wrong, as it’s my second language 🤷🏻‍♀️ I really love the 1910s and early 1920s, so I really enjoyed this video! :)

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Thanks for checking!

[@doro8856]

"Because lighting your table on fire is bad." ROFL!!

[@compactgirl]

One time I put fake candy cane on my tree my elderly father took one put it in his mouth then realized it was fake. It was so funny I miss my father.

[@anonymousperson4214]

My mum asked me to mention that holly is invasive in some places, so if you live in one as she does, you are officially encouraged to harvest as much as you want!

[@juliaharris7240]

Haha candy Jim

[@wildchildlikeu]

Nice gift though!

[@thehappyflapper]

candy Jim=I am marshmallow Groot

[@DisneyMissieMouse]

Are you from Canada? I’m hearing bits of an accent so I had to ask! ☺️

[@TheLongHairedFlapper]

Yes I am :)

[@helenamirian908]

I think that the reason there wasn't information on Christmas decor of the era is that it hadn't changed at all yet. Still the Victorian ways of doing things but they didn't want to admit it.

[@datatwo7405]

Unfortunately, we as modern living creatures see largely a tiny slice of the Victorians, an that focuses on either the very wealthy or the upper-middle class. The manority of people struggled in the most horrendous ways serving the two. We make the mistake in believing that life was like Downton Abbey or any of the other fictional stories we feed upon. Yes, they're more in line with our standard of living, but we’re an anomaly within the context of the entire written human history. Thus the labor revolutions of the turn of the century and during WWII. Sadly, there is a quiet but long term push within many countries to subvert those movements and return to systems that best suit the upper two classes albeit within a modern context, using names and words for those systems that sound more appealing and logical, when in fact they are anything but. Having said that, one of the main reasons it is difficult to find holiday ideas for decor is that Christmas has not yet become as commercialized as it did after the turn of the century. The holiday, as we experience it now, is a construct created by the retail industry as a means of exploiting it for the purpose of increasing profits. Sometimes we approach cultural traditions from the viewpoint of how we experience or practice them in the current time, not realizing that how we do things today may not have existed in the past. The amount of commercialization within the society we live in today was not as intense or even in existence then. This secularization of the holidays came about as a means of making them sources of high revenue for the retail industry. The extent of which we have even witnessed in our own lifetimes, where now holidays like Halloween, Easter, and even Valentine's Day have become heavy retail events. Christmas, originally, had traditionally been a modest affair prior to the early 20th century. That is, until retailers like Macy's and Gimbles set out to make it a large secular event whereby they could profit from it. The idea of gift-giving goes back centuries to the original story of the birth of Christ, when the three wise men brought gifts to the birth of the Christ child. Gift-giving had become a tradition of the Christmas season long ago, but unless you were of the small upper class, it was a very modest affair. Even up until the 1950s here in the U.S., it was by no means as elaborate or expensive as it became afterwards. Gifts tended to be more modest and far fewer in number, which, in comparison to today, even within the lower income brackets would seem meager and even depressing. But it wasn't, as it was just the norm. As for the decor itself, much of what would have been used or even considered originates from the more traditional aspects of decorations, whose origins had more to do with the natural elements of the time of the year rather than fictional characters or symbolic representations, i.e., bells, candles, snowmen, Santa Claus, etc. It is very important that we remember that most of the external aspects of Christmas are pretty much all that is left of its Pagan roots. This is why many of the examples you found from that time still relied heavily on bringing the outdoors indoors. Then, with the increased use of electricity, came the lights on the trees and eventually everything else. And even the trees themselves, which had usually been decorated with natural materials such as fruit, nuts, and home-made items, began to see a slew of items commercially made for the purpose. It is important to recognize that at the time there was a massive influence and availability of mass-made products due to the industrial revolution and the mechanization process of manufacturing itself. This, along with the ever-increasing growth of the middle class, a group that did not exist prior to the industrial era, created wealth unheard of for the masses. Prior to this, there were always primarily only two classes: the very tiny ruling and land-owning class, who had all the wealth, and everyone else. Even today, America's existence as we understand it was due to and built by the middle section of the middle class, beginning in the 1940s and continuing through the 1970s and 1980s. That middle section was massive in comparison to today. Much has changed these past three to four decades. The wealth has once again become concentrated and held by the upper 10%, which today includes the upper middle class. The massive middle section of the middle class is a fraction of what it was during the 1950s and 1960s, with the lower middle class and working poor making up the bulk of it now. Yet decades of purchasing habits and an emphasis on material consumerism have contributed to the ongoing growth of holiday merchandising, with Christmas still by far the largest portion of it. The Victorian era was in fact a miserable era for the underclass, and that has a history of its own. But even then, with the growing middle classes of both England and the U.S., the mechanization of production, and the quickly growing retail aspect of the economy, it wouldn't be until Macy's and Gimbles of NY began a marketing effort to introduce more commercialized attitudes to the holiday season. Even the concept of Santa Claus, who was and is an amalgamation of numerous countries' holiday versions, is strictly an American invention. The list of myths and legends from different countries, all with varying aspects of who and what we consider Santa Clause to be today, is quite extensive. When it comes to decor pertaining to the holiday season, it will largely be limited to those things unique to various countries' much earlier traditions. Those traditions, practices, symbology, and views relate to the practical and spiritual beliefs surrounding agriculture, their dependency upon it, and thus the continuation of life. Most of these having to do with the waning power of the sun, the coming of the dark time of the year, and then the sun's rebirth at the Winter Solstice. Which in the Northern Hemisphere would be between December 19 and 22, depending on the year. Thus, decorations would relate to that, primarily revolving around bringing into the home what survives or continues to live during that time of the year, which for our hemisphere would be fir, holly, etc. Due to their nature, seeming to be one of the few living plants to live through the winter was one more symbolic representation of life itself and/or the Sun's dying and rebirth. These are symbols and ideas coming from, but not only, the ancient Druids of the British Isles. And being that our origins as a nation are intrinsically tied to England as well as Europe itself, much of our traditions stem from them.