Orlando's Festival of Trees 2019

It's officially December and time to talk TREES, my tinsel-loving friends! John and I made our yearly trek to Orlando's own Festival of Trees, and I brought back alllll the pictures of my favorites. So let's dive in!

First a quick look at one of the lobby displays:

I really like the combo of evergreen trees with stick trees - and the fake snow skirts with lights under them! If I didn't have cats to worry about I would so be trying that.

Ok, let's start in the main foyer with the big BIG trees, where this sparkly blue monster was on a rotating base. So fancy.

(Shout-out to the OMA for doing a great job this year of matching the wall art to the trees!)

This tree is a LOT to look at, but my favorite parts were the branches sticking out the sides:

I'm all about dangly branches sticking out of trees. Very fun.

Here's a close-up. Look how the blue poinsettias positively GLOW:

I tried to take close-ups like this for a bunch of the trees; it was fun finding just the right section of ornaments to get the prettiest shot.

Across the foyer from Super Grover was this lovely Victorian style vignette:

Serious Grand Floridian vibes here - you Disney fans know what I'm talking about!

The tree is erupting with branches, bird cages, and butterflies:

With more of the same on the swoon-worthy mantle:

Here's a tree close-up:

Such a pretty color scheme with the wine, lime green, and gold.

Remember when mannequin tree skirts were all the rage? Well, we still have one hold-out:

With colors like these, I'm not complaining. They managed to make tree branches and trim look like peacock feathers! So pretty!

Let's move into the other galleries with this red-and-rustic number:

Confession: Most of my favorite photos this year are the close-ups.

See what I mean? I want to make Christmas cards out of all these ornament shots!

Every year I'm so excited to see what new thing designers are doing with their tree toppers. Will it be giant bows & birdcages? Stars & sprigs? Maybe disembodied elf legs will make a come-back? 

And yet, sadly this year was something of a disappointment, because nearly every single tree topper was the standard, perfectly lovely, spriggy explosion:

I think the designers all got together and agreed the spriggy explosion was the safest bet. Which it is, but it's also a little boring?

This tree had some weirdly bendy birch branches stuck around it, so at first I thought they were hula-hoops:

There was also so much tiny chain garland it almost felt like a spider's cocoon in there - which, come to think of it, would be a pretty cool theme. Hmmm.

Here comes the first of my two favorite trees this year:

The theme seems to be lions and owls? The letters around the base spell out lion, but then most of the metal cut-outs on the tree are owls:

Photos really don't do this justice; the cut-outs are partially glittered, and then the tree's blue lights in all those cobalt blue branches looked super dramatic.

Plus, THIS TOPPER:

This inspired me to make an owl cut-out for our Labyrinth tree.  Stay tuned to see if THAT works.

 Speaking of tree toppers, you guys know I love risk-takers, and I'm always on the hunt for new ideas. That said...

I'm totally seeing an ear of corn here. :D

The rest of the tree is gorgeous, though:

Happily I found a few other trees with more successful alternatives to the spriggy explosion topper. This one used a crown on top, which was sweet - though hard to see against the white walls:

Then this one used a giant wind turbine?!

I love it. If you're going with a theme, GO ALL IN.

Random nutcrackers for color:

And now more trees where the best parts are the close-ups:

Though I do like the giant bow on top of this one, reminds me of Minnie Mouse:

For folks who love horses:

These little plush ornaments were so cute!

In this next room I actually found the tree to be the least interesting part:

But check out that mantle:

And the fireplace:

And the side table!

Ok, you get the tree, too:

Don't get me wrong, this is a gorgeous tree. It's just a bit... bland. I wish it had an accent color, or something unusual in the garland - something to give it a little personality.

Now THIS, on the other hand:

Is ALL personality.

They decorated the whole tree around this center art piece of the three wise men:

And then the topper is a mosaic tile "JOY" with a riot of fun colors:

I love that bright pink flower with all the blue tulle.

This is a good reminder that you can use your tree like a picture frame: find one big center element you love, then decorate the rest to match!

Technically this next tree was an advertisement, but I like the idea of a dinosaur tree too much to skip it:

The fake ferns around the base! Yes!

There's a room at the Festival with lots of pretty table settings (you'll see more in my next post), and John kept asking what these weird black rings were:


I laughed because I thought he was joking, but then it turned out John really didn't know what they were. So tell me, gang: can you tell those are supposed to be snowmen?

And finally, my other favorite tree:

YAY TWISTY RAINBOWS!

With a big plush llama and shiny pillow ornaments, no less:


"Came to Sleigh" - I see what you did there. ;)


 Here's the wreath in the background:

 
Hand painted ornaments for the 12 days of Christmas and felted pom-poms. So cheerful!

I'll end with a cropped photo I think I'm going to use for my cellphone background:

Feel free to download it - or any of my photos here - to use on your phone, too!

I'll end here for now, but watch for the second half of my Festival photos later this week. Not only do I have more full-size trees to show you, I also have all my favorite wreaths and mini trees from the Festival! Those often have more theming and personality than the big trees, so I can't wait to show you.  (There's a science-themed mini-tree with test tubes and molecules. AMAZEBALLS.)

I also have another Labyrinth Party update coming soon, so you can laugh at more of our ridiculous projects. Stay tuned!

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You know I had to look, and I think I found the same rainbow tree on Amazon!

Rainbow Christmas Tree

Plus I spotted the big pom-pom garland at Michael's tonight. Consider yourself... ENABLED. ;)