For those wanting to add a touch of historical whimsey to their holidays, touring Colonial Williamsburg would be a great choice. Visitors during the Christmas holidays will see the historic area all decorated in homemade finery. Decorations made of foliage and fruits adorn windows and doors all along the town's main thoroughfare, the Duke of Gloucester Street, and you will find them embellishing houses in other areas of the historic district too. The smells of evergreen, smoking fires, cinnamon sticks, and hot mulled cider waft through the air as you walk around.
And if the sense of smell isn't enough to get you in the holiday mood, open your eyes and enjoy the festive decorations! Wreaths made of fresh greens (think lots of magnolia leaves, grapevine, holly, and evergreen boughs), red chili peppers, mistletoe, lotus seedpods, pineapples, dried quince slices, lady apples, cinnamon sticks, apples, oranges, cotton bolls, bird feathers, musical instruments, masks, and even oyster shells from the nearby James River can all be found as passersby check out the wreaths and holiday decorations.
What visitors won't find in the historic area are wreaths made with artificial elements, like tinsel or twinkling lights, fake fruit, and any material that would not have been available to 18th-century residents. Decorations back in the 18th century would have, if anything, been minimal. Back then, town dwellers would not have put precious fresh fruit on outside wreaths -- the wildlife would have had a field day, and using fresh fruits certainly would have been seen as frivolous and wasteful.
It was only when Christmas became more commercialized in the 20th century, that holiday decorating started taking its own art form in Williamsburg. We know that holiday decorations in Williamsburg's historic area went up in a modest way in the 1930s -- visitors would have seen a few wreaths on the doors of the Governor's Palace and at Raleigh Tavern. People started getting into the Christmas spirit shortly before World War II. Local garden clubs started to have contests for the best decorated in the historic tradition. The Williamsburg "look" caught on all around the country, and folks began purchasing Williamsburg decorations from shopping catalogs. Since the late 1960s, a Christmas Decorations Tour has been happening in the historic area of Colonial Williamsburg. Currently, designers start planning out their historic holiday decorations for Colonial Williamsburg by mid-summer, with wreaths going up on doors in the historic area starting in mid-November and lasting into January.
While walking around the historic area of Colonial Williamsburg, visitors will notice that some sort of story or theme might be found within the holiday wreaths. You might see masks and actors made out of paper mache inserted into a wreath near an outside theatre, or musical instruments like tin whistles on a wreath by the music teacher's house, or shells on a wreath at a local tavern like Chowning's. Outside the dressmaker's shop, you might find a wreath containing ladies' fans. As you pass by William Pitt's merchant store, you might spot a wreath full of toys and historic games that would have delighted children and their families back in colonial days.
My family stayed at the nearby Kingsmill Resort, which was decorated to the nines for the holidays. We enjoyed our one-bedroom river view villa (full kitchen and also washer dryer) and would go back in an instant. The views of the James River were so pretty. The Kingsmill Resort's inside spaces and also the grounds were beautifully decorated for the holidays. It was quite cold while we were visiting, and my daughters enjoyed standing by the fire and toasting marshmallows. The festive lobby was quite beautiful with a nice Christmas tree and other hand-made decorations.
It truly is a joy to experience Colonial Williamsburg at Christmastide. Global Wishes recommends spinning the globe and heading to eastern Virginia over the holidays. Not only is a trip to Williamsburg educational, but it is chock-full of festive holiday fun!
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