The charming origins of Christmas evergreen wreaths, garlands, and swags
Evergreen wreaths, swags and garlands make use of every part of a Christmas tree by re-purposing trimmed off portions. Hanging a wreath on a door or a wall is almost as essential to decorating at Christmas as setting up an evergreen tree. As it turns out, the two traditions come from the same place.
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Germans commonly credited with starting the Christmas tree tradition. “The tree gave birth to the wreath,” claims Ace Collins, author of “Stories Behind the Great Traditions of Christmas”. 16th century Europeans started the custom of bringing evergreens home during the winter. Pruning the tree was a part of the preparation process. “Limbs were often cut off in an attempt to make the tree more uniform in shape or to fit into a room,” Collins wrote. Instead of throwing the pieces of greenery away, the Europeans wove the excess into wreaths, garlands and evergreen swags.
“These people were living in a time when everything in their lives was used until it was gone,” Collins told TIME. Our ancestors threw next to nothing away. Everything was re-purposed and often became as much as a beloved tradition as the tree itself.
Christmas wreaths bring a new layer of meaning to “reduce, reuse, recycle”. Wreaths originally served as Christmas tree ornaments, and not as the standalone decorations we’re familiar with today. They were formed into a wheel-like shape partially for convenience’s sake — it was simple to hang a circle onto the branches of a tree — but the shape was also significant as a representation of perfection. It symbolized eternity, as the shape has no end.
Evergreen swags, bunches of fur or pine twigs tied together and decorated with ornaments, pine cones and bows, have become popular to hang on walls or drape over mantels. Garlands are created when lengths of evergreen are tied together lengthwise to create long and fragrant decorations. These are sometimes trimmed with lights, bows or other ornaments but are just as often left plain and simple. Garlands look lovely draped over doorways or strung across stairways.
Equally important was the material used to create the wreaths — the evergreen boughs. Evergreen trees were a species looked upon with admiration, since they, unlike most living things, thrive during even the harshest winter. The trees appeared in abundance in northern and eastern Europe, and people brought them into their homes. “That was a symbol to them of power, of resilience, and in a way, of hope,” Collins says.
Together, the circular shape and the evergreen material make the wreath a representation of eternal life. It is also a representation of faith, as Christians in Europe often placed a candle on the wreath during Advent to symbolize the light that Jesus brought into the world.
In that tradition, there are four candles in total— one for each week of Advent. In his book, Collins says that the first three candles represented the values of hope, peace and love. “The final candle, most often red in color, symbolized the joy of new life gained through the gift of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross,” he writes. At times, a white candle was lit on Christmas eve and welcomed Jesus’ birth.
The tradition of the wreath, along with many other Christmas traditions from across Europe, was adopted by the masses beginning in the 19th century. Collins says that the marriage of Victoria, Queen of the United Kingdom, to Prince Albert from Germany opened the door for Christmas traditions of other regions in Europe to become popular in England. In turn, British culture influenced American culture. Literature such as Clement Clarke Moore’s “A Visit From St. Nicholas” also fueled the growth of Christmas traditions such as decorating with wreaths.
Despite its widespread popularity today, the wreath, swag and garland started with humble beginnings. Collins points out that “we live in a throwaway culture, the wreath was born out of not throwing things away.”