I spent 2 and a half weeks hand making all my Christmas decorations! Why? Because I was on TV! I was on the 2024 series of Christie’s Handmade Christmas which is a Christmas based craft competition show, for those not familiar. So how did this all come about you may be thinking? I applied back in August after I got an email from a craft market organiser I follow, saying applications are open. I didn't expect much to come from it but I filled out the form and applied. I just assumed my work was too illustration heavy and not crafty enough for the show, but It was worth a try! Anyways, good job I did because the following day I got a phone call asking me all about my ideas for the show. I was very flustered and basically came up with everything on the spot - I have no idea what I even said! I must have said something right because I got another phone call the next day saying I was through to the next stage of the casting process (there were quite a few stages!)
Eventually I had to submit a design document with a detailed plan of what I would make for the two shows (the christmas tree decorating show and if I won that and got through to the final, a table centre piece) I put my best foot forward and spent a couple of days putting these plans together and sent them off. They said If we hadn't heard back from them in three weeks, you didn't make it through to the show, and with the three week deadline having passed I just assumed I didn't get it. At the time I thought it was probably for the best as I was busy enough running my shop and doing freelance jobs, no way could I also hand make enough decorations to fill a whole tree.
Anyway a few days after the deadline, I got a phone call saying I was on the show which I couldn't quite believe! The next two and a half weeks are probably the hardest I've ever worked on something (maybe excluding my final year uni project). From waking up to going to sleep, I did nothing but make collaged tree decorations! Then for the last three days of the deadline I made a 3D paper collage owl to use If I made it to the final. All of this probably couldn't have come at a worse time as I was also going to be moving out of my family home in Manchester and moving to Oxford to live with my boyfriend at the end of the month! It was a very stressful time indeed.
What did I make?
To start off I began with my present filled steam train! Almost all my decorations were entirely made from recycled card (from things like cereal boxes) and hand painted printer paper using acrylic paint. I also used a lot of foraged elements to give everything a woodland feel, like acorn tops, pine cones and twigs. Here is a bunch of train process pictures!
I used my favourite wood making technique which is dry brushing paper and cutting it into thin strips. I like to rip little bits out of the strips to mimic knots in the wood, and stick the strips to a dark background with little gaps between them. It’s very effective, but very time consuming!
Adding on all the lovely foraged elements. Acorn tops as wheels and twigs to hold up the roof and railing.
The finished train (well, its missing the mice!)
I wanted my tree to be filled with as many different modes of transport as I could make, to show all the different ways the mice deliver present, with the hot air balloons being next on my list. These were made by cutting out hundreds of balloon shapes and painting each one either pink, green or red - I even added gold leaf to some! These all got folded in half and glued together to form a hot air balloon. Then I made the basket out of card covered in painted paper, and attached it to the balloon using twine. The baskets eventually got filled with mice and presents, with some having ladders hanging from them.
Making some smaller decorations
Making my mice
With the deadline very quickly approaching, I had one more day left in the schedule to finish my tree decorations, and I left the most important part till last - adding on all my mice. I drew, cut out, and painted over 50 mice using my HIMI gouache set, and one by one stuck on over 100 ears. This went on very late in to the night, but what a difference It made to the decorations. It filled them with so much charm and character!
A selection of my favourite finished decorations
I made candy canes from sticks cut at an angle and glued back together to create that signature curve. Then I painted them with lovely uneven stripes, making sure part of the stick was showing through. I wanted it to have a very organic hand crafted feel… which is basically a way of getting away with any messy bits!
After two and a half weeks of my room looking like a Christmas bomb had hit it, my decorations were complete and I just had to hope and prey I had enough to fill a tree. I then moved straight on to making a paper owl to use as a table centre piece (incase I got through to the final of the show), but more on that soon.
Finally at the start of October, and one day after moving house, I had to travel all the way to Scotland on the train with a suitcase full of paper ornaments and pinecones to start filming. The whole filming thing was kind of exactly how it is on TV except there's a lot more takes. I think we had to walk through a door about 10 times until they got the right shot! Day one went pretty smoothly and I got through to the final! I then had to spend the next two days in a hotel frantically prepping for it. Then I did the whole thing again with another set of lovely contestants, this time decorating a table and not a tree. Everyone in both rounds were so skilled at what they did, and each of our builds couldn't have been more different. From printmaking, pottery, wood carving, crochet, flower arrangements, every craft was represented. A very talented wood carver won the whole show but I'm very proud of what I achieved
First, lets look at the finished tree! I had a suspicion the tree provided would be very large, having watched previous episodes of the show, and I wasn’t wrong. I would have loved for the tree to be a lot fuller and densely packed, but there was nothing more I could have done. Luckily I had enough to just about fill the tree enough to be acceptable… although the back was very bare!
Here’s what the decorations look like on my much smaller 5ft tree. This is the original vision I had and I absolutely love how it looks! How many people can say say the have a completely hand made Christmas tree! I’m very proud of it. The only issue is, I don’t want to take it down.
Like previously mentioned, I also had to make a 3D paper owl for the final, which would be a table decorating competition. I didn’t want to spend too much time on it as there was only a 1 in 4 chance I would even get through, so I set aside three days to make it. The base of the body was made from recycled packaging foam cut down to size and the wings were made from thick card. Everything then got covered in collage.
Heres the finished table layout from the final of the competition. I also made a few of my Robins which I had already designed from a previous project (I just had to print them out an construct them). As well as the centre piece, I had to hand make my napkin holders, crackers and name placements, which was as last minute as you could get really! I came up with those the night before in the hotel.
And there you have it, thats my entire experience from applying, to making and to filming in a nut shell! If you want to hear more, and see extra behind the scenes, this is the video for you. And if you would like to watch the show heres a link: https://www.channel4.com/programmes/kirsties-handmade-christmas I’m on episode 1 and 5 of the 2024 series.
Thanks for stopping by!