Looking for outdoor Christmas decorating ideas to welcome your guests? Set the scene by dressing your home with jolly outdoor Christmas decor ideas.

Extend your festive decor beyond your front door, inviting your community to share in the celebrations. The festivities of last year’s Christmas may have been different from seasons past, but with that came the chance to get creative and focus on smaller ways to celebrate. There was less frantic dashing about; more time chatting to neighbours from our doorsteps, decorating our windows to give passers-by a smile, and connecting with our community.

Outdoor Christmas decor ideas

Let’s continue the shared festive spirit by giving our outdoor space a festive welcome this Christmas by adorning homes with stylish bows, decorative wreaths and warm, twinkling lights.

First impressions count, so give these outdoor Christmas ideas a go to make a fabulous festive first impression.

1.Wrap the front door

Image credit: Future

Trim your front door with a huge ribbon, tied into a bow. This fabulous decorating idea is an easy way to make a wow statement for the exterior of your home. It’s been trending for the the last few Christmas, as homeowners look to make more of an impact with their out Christmas decor ideas.

Use a lightweight material in two lengths, long enough to drape from top to bottom one way and across horizontally. Secure the material on the edges of the door with a staple gun to keep it in place, but out of sigh – ensuring it still closes with no effort. Simply tie the two lengths in the middle, as if wrapping your front door like a gift to the outside.

2. Hang a hearty wreath on the door

Image credit: Future/ Rachel Whiting

Go for an oversized wreath to make a real style impact for your front door. Team the foliage with a garland above the front door. to add a further touch of greenery to the exterior. Adding fairy lights to the garland will ensure it is dressed to impress once the daylight fades.

3. Place a Christmas tree by the front door

Image credit: Future

Who says Christmas tress are only for indoors? A small potted Christmas tree is perfect to set the scene for season’s greetings by the front door. The beauty of a potted tree is that it can use used year after year, simply keep it well looked after in a corner of the garden throughout the rest of the year.

3. Frame the front door with foliage

Image credit: Future

Wrap a foliage arch around your front door and thread it with baubles and outdoor fairy lights. Balance the look with topiary bushes either side of the entranceway, decorated in the same way to give them a seasonal spruce up. Hang a natural foliage wreath on your front door to complete the look.

4. Curate a decorative bauble and light display

Image credit: Future

Use large glass lanterns to add an alternative festive touch to your doorstep. Instead of filling the vessels with candles try adding colour and glow with a selection of baubles and fairy lights. Mix festive colours, from holly red to regal gold to make the baubles stand out – or choose to coordinate your indoor Christmas colour scheme.

trail a string of LED fairy lights to ensure your display is as captivating by night. Battery-powered LED lights are safe and won’t blow out in the wind. Try Lights4fun for a good range of lights.

5. Set the scene with prop presents

Image credit: Future

If you have a porch, wrap some empty boxes as pretend presents and stack them outside your door, along with lanterns and a mini Christmas tree to set the scene for present giving.

6. Decorate the windows

Image credit: Future

Snowflake window stickers will give your glass panes a seasonal touch. Decorate the windows to projection the festive spirit for those who pass by. This Christmas window decorating idea uses simple paper angels tacked to the inside of the glass, providing a festive motif by day and a glowing angelic shadow by night time illuminations.

7. Fill the trees with lights

Image credit: Future / Alun Callender

There’s nothing more magical for outdoor Christmas decor ideas than twinkling lights. They instantly add ambience and warmth to the occasion. Dress any trees immediately outside your front door, or along a path, with generous strings of outdoor LED lights to elevate your festive decorating scheme.

8. Stage a cosy outdoor spot

Image credit: Future/ David Brittain

Style up a favourite bench as the perfect place to greet guests to your home. Add a snug stove or brazier and set out mulled drinks to keep the cold at bay. Don’t forget to pin up a decorative wreath to celebrate the season in style.

9. Create a pretty entrance with foliage

Image credit: Future/ Ben Anders

Armfuls of seasonal foliage in a substantial water-filled container can be added to and refreshed over the festive season. A nosegay composed of the same plants has been hung at the window and completed with a berry-strewn wreath.

For another nice touch, follow Scandinavian tradition and lay a branch of fir on the doorstep on which guests can wipe their feet before entering the house.

10. Wrap fairy lights around a bush

Image credit: Future/ Ben Anders

Add an element of fun to your garden scheme come Christmas. Battery-powered outdoor fairy lights are easily draped in an around hedging and trees, while illuminated creatures, such as this snowy owl, lend a whimsical feel to the overall effect. Christmas is the party season, so what better way to decorate your garden, patio or courtyard with a spattering of twinkling lights.

11. Style in symmetry

Image credit: Future/ Brent Darby

Use evergreen shrubs and a classic door wreath to give the entrance to your home a festive makeover. A pair of urns and two standard shrubs form a symmetrical frame around the front door, making this property feel extra special at Christmas. A porch is the perfect place for storing walking boots and firewood, adding an extra rustic edge.

12. Adorn the gate with a festive wreath

Image credit: Future/ Ben Anders

Ring the change this season at the entrance to your home. A frosted pine-cone wreath will make a statement on any fence, gate or door. For an extra touch of festive glamour; add your own detail, such as the shimmering silk rose and organza ribbon here. A few sprigs of foliage will add a touch of greenery to this frosty winter scheme.

13. Install a pretty display

Image credit: Michelle Garrett

Create an outdoor Christmas scene with minimal effort. Fill a rustic trug with seasonal offcuts from your garden (or get them from your local florist) and craft a candle holder for a garden table with a braid of delicate gypsophila.

14. Add a touch of New England style

Image credit: Future/ Brent Darby

Combine English style with East Coast flair on your Christmas porch. Here, white-washed cladding is used to evoke American charm, while vintage finds like the reclaimed sleigh and zinc planters create a nostalgic feel.

Red ‘Santa’ tree toppers and candy canes are tongue-in-cheek but the foliage-and-feather wreath mounted on the wooden door is a pure Christmas classic and a real show-stopper.

15. Spell it out

Image credit: Future/ Ben Anders

Deck your home outdoors as well as in this Christmas to put visitors in the festive spirit before they step through the front door. For a more contemporary treatment, use battery-powered lights to spell out a seasonal message of your choice.  Stick to warm yellow lights to keep the scheme cosy and classic.

16. Make an entrance

Image credit: Future/ Paul Raeside

Give your outdoor space a festive flavour this season. The adventures may have come to a close, but the magic continues outside with a silver wreath, Christmas tree, stag and lashings of fake snow.

A frosty palette of icy whites and forest greens has been paired with cosy Nordic accents and a sprinkling of Narnia for a bewitching festive look.

17. Light up a pathway

Image credit: Future PLC/ David Brittain

Create a stunning outdoor Christmas scene by combining twinkling candles with beautiful foliage. Make a frosty path more welcoming with border tealight holders – a row of twinkling candles will light the way and create a celebratory atmosphere for a Christmas party.

How can I decorate my house for Christmas outside?

There are many ways to decorate the outside of your house for Christmas for a magical greeting for guests and neighbours.
Easy ways to add a festive look to your exterior, firstly is hanging a wreath on your front door; ‘Why not match it to the same colour as your door, window frames or even your garage?’ suggest interior stylish Laurie Davidson. ‘Add twinkle to potted plants outside with outdoor battery fairy lights.’

‘Try dressing low hedges with sparkly net lights, ideal for plentiful coverage. Snowflake window stickers will give your glass panes a touch of festive cheer. Wrap a foliage arch around your front door or frame with a length of garland. Add decoration to any foliage by threading it with baubles and fairy lights.
Line your path or porch with outdoor lanterns filled with battery- operated candles, baubles and poinsettias or holly.’

Even if you’re going away for Christmas, dress up the front of your house for everyone to enjoy.

The post Outdoor Christmas decor ideas – stylish ways to add festive magic to exteriors appeared first on Ideal Home.

If you’ve been looking for ways to give your hallway a makeover then take a leaf out of this mum’s book, as she created a cool tribute to her six children.

Having thought about different stairway wall decor ideas, Janine Cars from Devon came up with this novel approach, which not only gave the space a new look but cost her under £80.

Racking her brain for a way of adding some excitement to her hallway, Janine decided to create the tribute to her children, aged 10 months, four, eight, 10, 13 and 15. ‘I recently started to decorate the hall and stairs and really wanted something different to take centre focus on the wall,’ she told money-saving community LatestDeals.co.uk.

Hallway tribute makeover

Image credit: Janine Cars

Determined to find a way of bringing pizzazz to her hallway ideas without spending a fortune, Janine decided to print out self-adhesive wall vinyl and buy some clocks and frames from Asda to create the tribute. The feature wall has each of her children’s time and date of birth, as well as their names, birth weights and photographs.

‘I saw a few similar ideas on the internet, but nothing with the wow factor,’ Janine recalls. ‘I sent some screenshots to my friend Amanda, who has a small business called Wavey Soul. She specialises in macrame, however, she also does wall decals.’

Before

Image credit: Janine Cars

Having explained her vision, Janine commissioned Amanda to create some wall decals with each child’s name, birth weight and date of birth.

As the writing is self-adhesive, it’s easy to attach each word to the spot that you want it. ‘You simply place the words on the wall, rub the decal to secure and peel back the transfer paper it’s on,’ says Janine.

The wall clocks and picture frames were bought in her local Asda, and Janine used a spirit level and tools to put them up on the wall. ‘The frames were £1.50 for two, and I bought six so they cost £4.50 in total,’ she says. ‘The clocks were £6 each and it cost me £36 for the wall vinyl.’

After

Image credit: Janine Cars

Printing out the photos online also helped keep costs down, and each one came to just 50p! Janine is over the moon with how her hallway turned out – and luckily, so is her family.

The post Mum created an adorable hallway tribute to her children for under £80 appeared first on Ideal Home.

The often-neglected hallway is the trunk of the home that every other room branches off from. Colour psychologists believe the colour you should never paint your hallway is highly saturated red.

Thoughtful hallway colour schemes set the tone for the rest of your home, welcoming both you and guests in. We spoke to colour experts about red flags when it comes to decorating this high-traffic area.

Country Homes and Interiors | Housetohome.co.uk

The colour you should never paint your hallway

‘The first colour to really consider before using is red,’ begins colour psychologist Lee Chambers. ‘For some people, this can feel like walking into a warning sign.

‘The sense of threat and danger can feel anything but welcoming,’ he adds. If you like the idea of a rouge hallway, deeper shades like a rich maroon or oxblood could work.

They’re also having a moment after featuring heavily in Adele’s new music video… But anything too bright and vivid could feel jarring – and Christmassy when you don’t want it to be.

Contemporary hallway with red sideboard | Hallway decorating | Style at Home | Housetohome.co.uk

Natasha Bradley, Lick’s Head of Colour and Lead Interiors Expert agrees with Lee. She says that since it’s the first room you enter, you don’t want anything ‘too much,’ or tones that might make you feel agitated.

She recommends staying away from bright red, orange and yellow. ‘Those three colours, which are highly saturated, are the completely wrong colours to put in a hallway,’ she says.

Instead, Natasha recommends warmer, earthier versions that are a little more muted.

Image credit: Lick Paint

So, what are the alternatives? Lee Chambers suggests steering clear of red hallway ideas and going for a light, cheery yellow or a mellow peach.

‘Both bring warmth, a subtle positivity and a feeling of refreshment when returning after a long day,’ he muses. But what about if you want to make a statement?

Hallways are known for being a brilliant space to have a bit of fun because we don’t spend hours on end in them. Natasha loves seeing people make a feature of their hallway.

Ornate hallway | step inside Queen of Shops’ Mary Portas’ vibrant Victorian home | house yours | housetohome

‘You don’t spend all your time in this space so you can afford to be brave, but this doesn’t mean you need to go mad,’ she says. ‘I recommend choosing darker tones in a hallway because it makes the rooms leading off feel lighter,’ says Natasha.

We previously wrote about a similar Farrow & Ball hallway paint secret one of the brand’s colour experts uses in her own home. Dark hallways aren’t for everyone, though.

Colour consultant and therapist, Suzy Chiazzari warns against using dark shades of green, blue, grey and purple. These can have a negative effect on your mood and energy levels, she says.

The post You should never paint your hallway this colour, according to colour psychologists appeared first on Ideal Home.

In this Sage Bambino review I put Sage’s newest (and smallest) coffee machine to the test for a few weeks, making delicious espresso and lattes from home. The Sage Bambino is compact, and its controls are minimalist and easy to adjust to. It makes high-quality coffee, first and foremost, and the manual steam wand is perfect for budding baristas to experiment with making latte art or frothy cappuccinos.

Sage is known for making many of the best coffee machines on the market, including some of the options you’ll find in our best bean-to-cup coffee machine guide. The Sage Bambino is not a bean-to-cup though, it takes coffee grounds to make single or double shots of rich espresso. It’s not cheap, but this is the most entry-level of Sage’s coffee machines, and doesn’t skip out on the quality design you’d expect to see from the brand.

Ideal Home rated: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Reasons to buy:

• High-quality build
• Compact enough for any kitchen
• Speedy pre-heat
• Excellent range of filters
• Makes brilliant espresso
• The steam wand is very quick to heat up

Reasons to avoid:

• It is expensive
• Brewing is a little noisy

Sage Bambino

Image credit: Sage

Buy the Sage Bambino, £329.95, at Sage Appliances

Specs:

• Coffee type: ground
• Control type: manual
• Water tank capacity: 1.4 litres
• Pressure: 9 bar
• Power: 1600W
• Dimensions: 19.5 (W) x 32 (D) x 31 cm (H)
• Weight: 4.9kg

Getting started with the Sage Bambino

The Sage Bambino comes in a very lightweight box, and it’s pretty much ready to go once you take it out of the box. Sage gives you four filters with the Sage Bambino: two double and two single, one with a double-wall design and another with a single-wall, which is best for freshly-ground beans. These can be tricky to remove from the handle, but because I tend to stick to single filters, this wasn’t a big issue for me.

Included is also a tamper, which compresses 18-22 grams of grounds perfectly evenly across the filter. Other Sage machines come with a razor to perfectly dose and make sure your grounds are even, but the Bambino does not have one which is a shame.

The stainless steel exterior is smart-looking, and it paired perfectly with my kettle. The narrow design is under 20cm, so it slots easily into any kitchen corner. The water tank at the back is easy to lift out and refill, but it does sit at the back of the coffee machine, so it can be fiddly to put back in.

Included in the machine is a water filter that slots into the tank. This needs to be replaced every few months. Before using the machine I flushed out the system with about five cups of water, and I was ready to go.

Making espresso in the Sage Bambino

Image credit: Sage

You can make single or double shots of coffee with the Sage Bambino using the buttons. There is also a button to turn on the steam wand, or shoot a stream of hot water out of the steam wand, which is great for topping up espressos to make a longer coffee. There is no button to turn the coffee machine on, but you can just press either of the espresso buttons to start the preheat process. It takes just three seconds to preheat, so the coffee is practically instantaneous.

You get your portafilter into position by pressing up and twisting until the handle is facing you. The 9-bar extraction pre-infuses your grounds to extract the very best of the coffee, and my single and double shots of espresso were both topped with a delicious crema. The brewing is quite noisy, especially because the machine rattles slightly, but so are most espresso machines.

Making latte in the Sage Bambino

I enjoy a latte in the morning, so I would never consider a coffee machine that didn’t come with a milk dispenser or steam wand. The Sage Bambino has a steam wand that’s powered by 130˚C steam pressure. It’s best to get the steam wand up to temperature first by switching it on and letting it flush out any water before switching it off and putting the wand in your jug with the milk of your choice.

I had just finished writing the De’Longhi Dinamica Plus review when I started reviewing the Sage Bambino, so it took some adjusting to go from a milk dispenser to a steam wand. That said, it’s fun to get into making your own steamed milk and pouring latte, cappuccino, and macchiatos, coffee-shop style.

To turn off the steam wand you just press one of the espresso buttons and it will switch off. This takes a few seconds, and once you remove your milk jug you should instantly wipe the steam wand clean with a damp cloth to prevent the milk from getting burnt onto the end of the wand. I also flush out the wand using the hot water button after steaming.

Cleaning the Sage Bambino

The drip tray pulls away from the Sage Bambino very easily, and the red button lifts up when it’s time to empty it. Emptying is easy enough, but what I did notice was the markings on the side of the coffee machine. As with any stainless steel coffee machine, the Sage Bambino marks very easily, especially with drips of coffee or splatters from the hob. Keep a damp cloth handy to wipe it clean after use.

Should you buy the Sage Bambino?

At £329.95, the Sage Bambino is not a cheap coffee machine. It is a good quality option though, and when it comes to espresso machines, it’s backed by one of the biggest names in the business. I’ve tried cheaper alternatives such as the Swan Retro One Touch Espresso Machine, and while it does essentially a very similar job, the Sage Bambino is certainly capable of producing a higher quality of coffee.

This is a brilliant coffee machine for those who really care about quality coffee, but live in a smaller flat or don’t have the money to buy a bean-to-cup machine. Of course, the quality of the coffee depends entirely on the grounds you use, and it’s best to pair your new machine with one of the best coffee grinders to make the grounds as fresh as possible when you make your drink.

About this review, and our reviewer

Millie Fender is small appliances editor at Ideal Home. She reviews everything from the best pod coffee machines to air fryers from her own kitchen, meaning these tests have been carried out in the same conditions that you’ll be using the machine.

The Sage Bambino was kindly sent to Millie by Sage, and Millie tested for a few weeks before writing this review. This gave her the chance to test all of its functions as well as cleaning and check for any troubleshooting. While she prefers a frothy latte or an iced cappuccino, her partner is never running on less than three americanos, so the Sage Bambino was very thoroughly tested.

The post Sage Bambino review: a compact coffee machine for quality espresso appeared first on Ideal Home.