Christmas Ornaments and Decorations Over the Years

In the 18th century, Nuremburg began producing an angel called a “Rauschgoldengel”, which means gilded tin angel. It had a wax face and hands, and a gown and crown made from tiered gilded tin.

The glass ornaments industry did not begin until the mid-19th century, so the people were delighted with the wax ornaments.

The Glass Christmas Ornament

Glass making was done in Bohemia (modern Czechoslovakia) and along the border areas with Germany at a place in Thuringia called Lauscha. Early glass balls were made at Lauscha as end of the day games. Glass blowing was hot, thirsty work, and the blowers would consume quite a bit of ale in the course of a day. Mild though it was, by the time the work day was almost through, many were a little merry, and would have these glass blowing games to see who could blow the largest ball before the glass burst. These balls were gathered up by the wives, who would silver them, by swirling a silver nitrate solution around the insides. Then they were sold as Christmas balls to avert evil from the home over Christmas, hung or stuck onto sticks in the hallway of the house. This custom was a later version of the Holy Bough customs.

When gas came to Lauscha in 1863, glass blowing became much easier. Now the glass could be blown much thinner without bursting, and it was possible to use wooden moulds to blow the glass into to create shapes and “figurals”. By the 1870s, Lauscha was exporting glass balls to Britain and America. By the 1890s just about everybody in Britain had trees laden with glass shapes.

Europe clung to tradition for a while longer, alternating glass with traditional fruits (Germany), paper scissorcuts (Poland), and straw (many alpine areas in Switzerland, Austria etc.) The Italians had a Ceppo instead of a tree, which was pyramid shaped shelves with a Nativity on one shelf and fruits and floral decorations on the others. Scandinavian countries had ideas that were a far cry from these, and used grain garlands, straw goats, little wooden gnomes called Tomte, Nisse or Gubbe. Red and white themes and many candles.

Around 1880 or so, F. W. Woolworth’s began selling imported German Christmas ornaments on a large scale basis. At first it wasn’t a given that sales would thrive since these items were still considered unusual, but by 1890 Woolworth was selling $25 million dollars per annum in ornaments.

Christmas Tree Lights

There is a legend that says that Martin Luther, founder of the Protestant religion began the custom of putting candle lights onto trees. The end of the 19th century saw experiments with gas lights (many blew up!) and early electric lights too. The first electrically lighted tree was created by Edison in America, in the 1880s.

Since many people still preferred the use of candles, it was not until World War II that most of Britain converted to electrically lit trees.

Post-War Decorations

The 1950s brought with them the widespread use of artificial decorations in both America and Britain. This trend lasted until the late 1970s, when natural decorations and the Victorian Christmas look became popular again in America, and Britain followed the same path in the late 1980s.

Reference Source:

The Christmas Archives

Christmas Decorations — A Potted History of Decorating

http://www.christmasarchives.com/decorations.html