A Modern and Rustic Christmas Mantel

My fireplace and mantel may be very rustic, but that does not mean I can’t add a bit of modern and whimsical touches to give it my own design style.  This year I used some creative ideas to make a modern and rustic Christmas mantel.

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This post was originally part of a blog hop hosted by HomeTalk.com and CountryLiving.com.

I am happy to be linking up with so many other bloggers for a blog hop hosted by Hometalk.com and CountryLiving.com for their Home for Christmas event.

 

This is our eighth Christmas in this house, and I have never decorated our mantel for the holidays.

To be honest, when you don’t really like a certain room in your house, and don’t have the budget available to totally rip it apart and start all over, the room can quickly become a dumping ground for clutter. In the past I just couldn’t muster any enthusiasm for decorating the mantel for Christmas.

Then this year, I had to spend three months sleeping in this room after a tree fell on our house and nearly destroyed our master bedroom. Over time, the room sort of grew on me, or at least I felt more comfortable in the space.

Don’t get that confused with accepting how it looks, I have just moved up the renovation of this room on my schedule of to-do lists.

When the invitation to join this blog hop from Hometalk.com and CountryLiving.com came along, I decided it was just the motivation I needed to finally create a fabulous mantel display for the holidays.

Rustic stone fireplace mets modern craft projects.

Our fireplace is HUGE, and built with native Tennessee stone found near our property.  The mantel is a solid block of rustic and aged wood from a barn built in the mid 1800’s.   Definitely not the style of fireplace and mantel you would expect in a mid-century modern home, but exactly what you would expect for a southern home on a wooded lot in Tennessee.

 

 

For this Christmas mantel display, I decided I needed to soften the rough edges of this dark fireplace and room, with light, color, and some whimsical touches.  What better way to do this than with a display of modern tree forms, cone shaped trees, and string lights.

The focal point of the mantel display was created from a stack of wooden yard sticks from Home Depot.

 

Before I cut the first piece, I first measured the space above the mantel to the ceiling line to determine the size of the project.

I decided the larger of the two modern trees would be around 24 inches tall.  I cut two of the yard sticks down to 24 inches and glued them together at one end to create the triangle shape of the tree.

 

The size of the bottom piece was easily determined by measuring the distance between the two side pieces and cutting another yard stick to fit.  The trunk of the tree was formed by cutting three 8 inch pieces and gluing them together.  All pieces were glued together using Elmer’s Wood Glue.

5 Yard Sticks was easily enough to make two modern tree forms.

 

The second, smaller tree, was made with two 16 inch side pieces, another smaller piece at the bottom to form the triangle, and three 4 inch pieces for the trunk.  I waited at least four hours for all of the glue to dry before painting.

So Christmas green and Christmas red in acrylic craft paints were chosen because they would hide the orange colors of the yard sticks!  Even for these colors, it took four coats of paint until I couldn’t see the impressions or orange colors anymore.

I purchased two sets of white 50 count string lights for this project.

To attach the lights to the tree forms, I used Command strips Mini Hooks.

 

 

 

Rustic and Modern can mix together beautifully!

 

 

 

 

I decided to use the Command Mini Hooks instead of staples.  I can remove and reuse the string lights if I wanted to and I thought that staples may split the thin wood sticks.  The mini hooks were so much easier to use either way.

I attached the mini hooks wherever I needed them on the back of the forms to hide the ends of the string lights, hold the lights in place, and to connect the two string lights together.

Using Command Mini Hooks means I can very easily remove the strings of lights to use these modern trees in a different way.

This is how they look together all lit up and so festive looking on the rustic mantel.

 

 

To create the entire display, I first laid down some white fabric the length of the mantel to soften the look, and to hide the white cords for the lights.

 

I added my new cone shaped Christmas trees I created last week and posted about here.

 

Red, white and green quickly became the color theme for the mantel display, so I added some poinsettias, a red ornament, and a few Christmas cards I have already received for the season.

My white Christmas tree gets a new theme every year.

Once I set up my favorite white Christmas tree, using mostly red and green ornaments, and added our cherished crocheted red, white, and green tree skirt my husband’s grandmother made us years ago, the whole room and mantel display just came together perfectly.

 

 

 

 

2019 Update:  This room has been updated and remodeled since this post.  The room is now a much whiter and brighter space.  Check out the new look here.

 

Matthew 1:21    “She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

Proverbs 16:3   “Commit your work to the Lord, and your plans will be established.”

Be sure to visit other bloggers who are participating in the blog hop. #HomeforChristmas