How Colonial Williamsburg Decks the Halls, Eighteenth-Century Style

“In Colonial Williamsburg, Christmas almost never stops for us,” says Joanne Chapman, director of landscape services for the historic Virginia village and one of the behind-the-scenes orchestrators of its holiday decor. 

Springtime is for growing the greenery, fruits, and flowers in the on-site gardens for drying in the summer, and Chapman submits the order for wreath frames in July. Come September, it’s time to make a careful plan of attack and start putting out the first of the dried decorations. “We just amp it up from there,” she says. “It really begins to look like Christmas the week of Thanksgiving, when we start hanging the green wreaths and putting roping over the doorways. It’s magical.”  

In total, some eight hundred wreaths, studded with such delights as wooden toys, fresh fruits, dried pomegranate blossoms, and yarrow, adorn the doorways of each historic building, alongside greenery swags, garlands, and looping ribbons. Some decorations stay the same year after year, like those on the Governor’s Palace or an apple fan that always hangs above the greenhouse door, but designers still take creative license—within the parameters of using only materials and tools that would have been available in the eighteenth century. 

At the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum in Williamsburg, there’s the folk art tree, which displays hundreds of handmade ornaments. The tradition really took off in 1975 when First Lady Betty Ford requested that Colonial Williamsburg furnish the White House with traditional ornaments. “From newspaper clippings, it seems like everybody in Colonial Williamsburg came together and made about three thousand ornaments,” says Christina Westenberger, a manager at the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and the resident ornament expert. “The Folk Art Museum completely embraced the idea.” After that display at the White House, the ornaments came back to Colonial Williamsburg, and every year, Westenberger helps unpack them to decorate the folk tree—plus she and her team make more, such as miniature quilts or needlepoint houses. 

For both Chapman and Westenberger, the height of the magic arrives on Christmas Eve during the annual fife and drum ceremony.  “There’s a nip to the air, and you can smell cider and gingerbread and fire,” Westenberger says. “I would never miss Christmas at Colonial Williamsburg.”

Below, see photos of the decked-out historic center.

The Williamsburg Inn shines with gold lights and three trees, reflected in the pool out front.

The Robert Carter House sports multiple wreaths with whole oranges and two matching swags on either side of the door.

At the Capitol building, a wreath featuring seven whole pomegranates blends with a draped garland on a balcony.

A pine garland frames a doorway in the historic area. Chapman’s team used dried magnolia leaves, seed pods, and dried flowers to fashion the wreath. 

Sometimes, more is more—pomegranates, apples, cinnamon sticks, and bright dried flowers pop among this wreath’s greenery. Occasionally, Chapman and her team have to replace fresh fruit if a hungry squirrel pays a visit. 

A drawing of a historic apothecary serves as the focal point of this wreath featuring greenery and dried flowers alongside whole apples and oranges.

The folk art tree stands in the middle of a ring of poinsettias in the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum.

Hundreds of handmade ornaments hang on the folk art tree. Westenberger’s favorites include the burlap owls and dolls made of yarn.