Wreaths on windows, mantels and interior walls

Sizing to a window, not a door

The door convention this site uses — roughly two-thirds of the door width — does not transfer, because a window is usually being viewed from outside at a distance and is framed differently. What works is to size against the pane opening rather than the frame, and to keep the whole wreath inside the glass so it reads as deliberate from the street.

Where the power problem gets solved

A window wreath has the same difficulty as a front door wreath and worse: there is rarely an outlet at a window sill, and a cord down the wall defeats the point of the arrangement.

This is where battery stops being second best. The 24-inch battery pre-lit wreath at 50 LEDs is plain lit greenery with no cord at all, and the battery-operated Norwood Fir does the same in multicolor — which is otherwise almost impossible on a window without a visible cord. Both give up light output for it; the full trade is on battery vs plug-in decorations.

Buy battery pieces with an integrated timer only. A wreath in a window that somebody has to switch on and off by hand is a wreath that is dark for most of December.

Interior placements: mantel, stair wall, over a bed

Indoors, the constraints invert. There is usually an outlet within a room’s width, so a plug-in wreath with a built-in timer becomes the better choice — more light, no battery to think about.

The Crestwood Spruce at 160 published tips is the densest wreath we can verify and carries 50 warm white LEDs with a built-in timer, which suits a mantel where it is seen close up and the foliage has to hold up to inspection. The flocked Wintry Pine is the alternative where the room wants the frosted look; at 113 tips it is lighter but the flocking carries the effect.

Above a mantel, hang the wreath so its centre sits at about the height of the mantel shelf plus half the wreath, and check it against anything hanging there already. Over a fireplace in use, keep greenery well clear of the opening and the flue — and never hang anything lit where heat is rising into it.

Hanging without marking anything

The fixing question is why many people stop at one wreath. Three approaches cover almost every case, in order of how little they leave behind:

• Over the top of the sash or the door. Nothing is fixed at all; the weight hangs on the frame itself. This is the renter’s answer.
• Ribbon from an existing fixing. A curtain pole, a picture hook that is already there, a stair spindle. The ribbon becomes part of the arrangement rather than something to hide.
• Suction or adhesive on glass. Workable indoors on clean glass and unreliable outdoors in cold, which is where most disappointment with it comes from. Follow the maker’s own surface and temperature guidance rather than ours.

A lighter wreath makes all three easier, which is one reason the 88-tip Decorative Collection wreath earns a place here: it is the least dense of the National range and the flattest, so it hangs well in a window and behind a storm door where a heavily trimmed wreath will not clear the gap.

How many to buy for a facade

The door wreath being larger is what stops the arrangement reading as flat — the entrance should still be the focus. Door sizing is on what size wreath your door takes, the full ranking is on the best artificial wreaths, and storage for a set of four — which is a real consideration — is on wreath storage containers.