Ours come in three diameters and the difference between them is larger in person than it looks on a screen. Here is what each one does on an actual tree.
The three sizes
- 3.15 inches — the standard hanging ornament. Reads clearly from across a room without dominating a branch.
- 3.5 inches — noticeably more presence. This is the size to choose if the ornament is the gift rather than one of thirty on a tree.
- 4.5 inches — a statement piece. Needs a strong branch and space around it.
Where each one belongs on the tree
Decorators hang large ornaments low and towards the trunk, and small ones high and towards the tips. It is not a rule about taste; it is about branch strength and perspective. A 4.5 inch ornament on a thin tip will droop and turn.
If you are buying one special ornament for a 6 foot tree, 3.5 inches at eye height is the sweet spot. If you are buying a set to fill gaps, 3.15 is the size that disappears into the arrangement in a good way.
How many you need
The usual guidance is about 10 to 15 ornaments per foot of tree for a full look, which means 60 to 90 on a 6 foot tree. Most of those should be plain baubles. The printed, pictorial ones like ours are the punctuation, not the sentence — five to ten on a normal tree is plenty, and they get looked at individually.
That is also why the 4.5 inch is not the obvious upgrade. A tree with twenty large printed ornaments looks busy. A tree with three, placed where people stand, looks considered.
What they are made of
Printed edge to edge on acrylic, which is why the colour goes right to the rim rather than stopping in a border. Acrylic rather than glass for the obvious reason: these end up in boxes in lofts, and get knocked off by cats.
The design is printed into the surface, not stuck on, so it does not peel at the edges after a season in storage.
The gift box
Every ornament can be ordered with an elegant gift box for an extra $6.99, chosen as an option on the product page. It is worth it if the ornament is going to someone as a present and not worth it if it is going on your own tree. We do not pretend the box is discounted from some higher price, because it never was.
Buying as a keepsake
A large share of these are bought as a memory rather than as decoration — a pet, a hobby, a first Christmas somewhere new. If that is what you are doing, take the 3.5 inch. It hangs at the size a person notices without being the thing everyone comments on.
Where to browse
All of them are in Christmas ornaments — over thirteen hundred designs, so it is worth having a subject in mind before you start. Dogs, cats, cardinals, nutcrackers and snowmen are the largest groups.
If you are decorating a whole tree rather than buying one piece, the same themes run through our tree skirts and Christmas table runners, which is the easiest way to make a room look planned rather than accumulated.
Hanging them
Each ornament comes with a hanging cord already attached through the top. That is enough for a tree, but two small things make a difference on a full one.
Use a proper ornament hook rather than the cord alone for anything at 3.5 inches or above. The cord lets the piece swing and turn, which is fine on a tip and irritating at eye height where it will spend half its time showing you the back. A hook holds the angle.
Hang the printed ones where light falls on them. Acrylic catches light differently from glass, and a design that looks flat in a shadowed part of the tree comes alive next to a bulb.
Beyond the tree
A good share of these never go on a tree. They hang from a mantel garland, from a wreath, from a window catch, or from a rear-view mirror in December. The 3.15 inch is the size that works in all those places; the 4.5 inch is really a tree-or-wall piece.
They also work as gift tags on a large present, which is why the gift box option exists — the ornament is both the tag and the second present.
Storing them
Acrylic does not shatter, which removes the main reason for the compartment boxes people buy for glass ornaments. A shoebox with the pieces flat and not stacked under weight is enough. What acrylic does dislike is heat: a loft in an American summer can reach temperatures that will warp a thin acrylic piece over years. Store them inside the house if you can.
Keep the hanging cords untangled by threading them onto a length of ribbon before the box goes away. It takes two minutes in January and saves twenty next December.
Buying more than one
If you are building a set rather than buying a single piece, keep to one size across the group. Three ornaments at 3.5 inches spaced around a tree reads as a collection; three at different sizes reads as three separate purchases, which is what they were.
Ordering in December
Everything is printed after the order comes in, which is what makes a catalogue this size possible — nothing sits in a warehouse waiting to be wrong. The trade is that there is a making time before it ships, and in December that matters.
Order by the first week of the month if the ornament is a present that has to be under a tree. Later than that and it becomes a January keepsake, which is fine for something bought for yourself and not fine for a gift with a date attached.
Why acrylic rather than glass
Two reasons, and neither is cost. The first is that an all-over print needs a surface the ink can bond into, and glass needs a coating on top — which is the layer that chips at the rim after a season in a box. The second is that ornaments live in lofts and get knocked off trees by cats, and acrylic survives both.
If you are decorating a whole room rather than a tree, the same designs appear on tree skirts and table runners, which is the quickest way to make things look planned.
The trade is weight. An acrylic ornament is light enough to turn in a draught, which is why the hook advice above matters more here than it would on a glass bauble.
From the range
Ornaments in the three diameters compared above: