which do you prefer — real or fake xmas trees?
When I was growing up, we always had a fake tree. During the ’70s it was a dazzling aluminum number. My grandparents always had a fake tree, too; I remember helping my Grandfather place the steel branches into the pegged-hole trunk. When I finally was able to decorate a little pad of my own, I could not wait to get real Christmas tree. In New York City, there are tree vendors on every corner this month, and the air is filled with their lovely fresh scent. We’ll be picking one up this weekend! But, there are some pretty cute fake trees out there, like this one from West Elm. If you’re green-minded, you may feel guilty about having a real (dead) tree in your home, but over at Treehugger they say that real is better than fake, because they’re easy to recycle. (In NYC you can drop your old tree in a mulching pile.) What’s in your house this year? Do you prefer real or fake trees? — Angela M.
I prefer the fake one. This year i felt really guilty buying a real one! So I decided to buy a fake one at urban outfitters, besides the fake one can last you years and years!!
Oh, I prefer real trees: my mom bought a fake one that we used for a few years, but eventually we (my four siblings, my dad, and I) had a real tree to decorate with colored lights and funny ornaments in the family room while she had hers to decorate in the “Christmas” room – the living room that was off-limits except at Christmastime. Hers was always decorated with silver and gold and ribbons and angels, it looked like it came from a Martha Stewart Catalog. It’s funny…Santa never seemed to like putting trees under that one.
This year, though, as I’m living alone in a small apartment, I didn’t get a tree. As a surprise – one that I recieved FedEX just Monday – my mom sent me a fake tree. It is pretty small, comes packed flat, and pre-decorated, and makes me laugh just to look at it. All I had to do was stick it on the pole it comes with, and it uncoils down to the floor, then plug in. Instant festivity!
Real trees. Growing up, I had a fake tree, but my fiance and I have always had real trees.
In my view, it’s very environmentally friendly to buy a farmed Christmas tree — The tree that you pick out and cut down has been growing there for years, pumping out oxygen, and a new tree will be planted in its place almost immediately.
Fake! Feel so lazy admitting this but I was so happy with how I decorated my little tree about 4 years ago that I decided to just wrap it up as is and stick it in a closet. Every year I unwrap it and plug it in — so easy and it leaves more time for shopping.
I love real trees. My husband has been thinking about getting a live tree (but I dread lugging a heavy pot up and down our porch stairs.)
Real trees (in Oregon) are quite inexpensive and come from local family farms so they’re more earth friendly for us. (If only they were organic!)
I do have several small fake trees (all second hand). My favorite is a vintage white tinsel tree that looks like it was homemade.
I prefer real trees, but hate the hassle of them – getting it home, cleaning up the needles, and finding an environmentally reponsible way to dispose of it. No thanks!
Because of this I’ve gone tree-less in the past, but am probably going to go the reproduction-vintage feather or tinsel tree route this year.
I almost gave in this year and purchased a fake when I spotted a pink feathered tree at Michael’s. I hesitated and someone else got it. Besides, Christmas isn’t Christmas (for me) without that luscious pine scent. Heaven.
I don’t think I could do a fake tree– although I have to confess that my family stopped celebrating Christmas at least in part because the pine needles were such a hassle to clean up. I’d rather have a single real pine branch than a fake tree.
real. i do get a bit of guilt when we go to get the tree, but fake just wouldn’t be the same. our tradition is to go to the family-owned tree farm down the street and pick out a nice skinny tree for our little house. after the holidays we put it out by the firepit to dry out. come summertime we have our friends over for the traditional christmas tree burn – they flame up like you wouldn’t believe!
Oh, I love the smell and look of a real tree, but the upkeep is a pain in the neck, so a fake tree with pine-scented candles and wax tarts it is!
I’m very allergic to pine, so that’s an easy call for me. I’ve been so miserable this week with allergies!
real. no contest.
We have a real tree each year. We have been buying from the same family for five years. It is a nice family tradition that I enjoy more than just opening a box. We live in the coastal south so the trees are used to refurbish offshore reefs around SC and GA. That makes me feel good.
All that said, I have been searching for a cool, retro non-green fake tree to use as a kitchen tree. Each year I wait until after Christmas wanting to find one on sale and they are gone. I think I need the tree on sale at West Elm.
I love love real trees, the smell is amazing. However in Chicago getting a real tree that lasts more than a week is impossible and expensive. So I have a tiny silver tree that fits my space just fine.
Real of course! BUT, I stopped in at Paleys’ on my cross from CT. to NY State last night and they had this FAKE wreath and I bought it for the cottage (First time ever!). I am tucked away in a 1889 cottage in Woodstock and I threw it up over the fire place last night. I feel like Jack Nicholson in The Shining! Are madness and isolation the same thing? I need to get my butt to my city neighborhood where there are crazy people and NO trees.
fake fake fake!!!
real. i think we’re one of the few families that still go out in the woods to get our tree. it’s usually one that needs to be cleared anyway because it’s too close to a building or powerlines or somesuch, so i dont feel bad about cutting it down. that and we have 80 acres of land, the majority of which is trees.
hmm. i live in chicago and my 30 dollar real tree is lasting just fine. if you have a car and can travel to mchenry, you can even cut your own at pioneer tree farm.
I forgot to answer this.
When I was a kid, it was ALWAYS real trees. My family was poor before my mom remarried, but we usually had a real tree anyways. After she married my stepfather, she had a lot of discretionary income, which she often spent at the local year-round Christmas decorating shop. She is the sort of person who was always on pre-purchase lists for the new, cool thing, like pre-programmed marquee-style lights with a control box, or a hangable programmed electronic system of real metal bells that you can put on the tree or use with garland. Each bell rang a specific tone, and were wired to actually play different Christmas songs. (I don’t know if that makes sense, but I mean that they weren’t a set of bells that played a recording of bells playing these songs – they had a control box that told them what order to play in, and they really played the songs themselves.)
The thing is, my stepfather was a paraplegic and I have never been very strong, so it was always up to my mom to get the tree into the house and into the stand and in place… and she’s a little allergic to pine, particularly the sap. When I was a teenager, in particular, we always had really huge real trees, lots of lights and gizmos, moving parts, you name it. An over-the-top old-timey Christmas tree. Our living room had a mirrored wall, so we always put the tree there. I did a lot of non-tree decorating, and I usually did most or all of the ornaments and garland.
After I got older, we started getting fake trees to make it a bit easier on my mom. When my stepfather passed away, we even scaled down the fake trees (we spent Xmas in hotels for a few years, because Disney World really is the happiest place on earth at Xmas, especially if you only live an hour or two away from it). We started trying tabletop trees.
Now there are two trees in the family, both pre-lit. One is huge and has realistic plastic needles, and was only used the year we bought it (I believe this tree is being given to me and my fiance). The other is cheaper and around 4 feet tall, cost about $40 at Target a few years ago, and is used on top of a big square coffee table. It’s the perfect size for an apartment. Before this, we had a fake tree that was much smaller, and had fiber-optic elements on its branches. It was pretty and fabulously kitschy, but it made a weird whining noise as it cycled through colors.
I think real trees are nice and probably environmentally friendly (though NOT CUTTING THEM DOWN is probably even more environmentally friendly!) – but fake trees are easier to deal with, hands down. So many aspects of a real tree are a pain in the butt, like trying to water it with packages around it. It’s hard to get lights on a real tree, and your hands and arms and clothes get sap on them, and you get pricked a lot unless you chose one of the softer varieties (which don’t hold ornaments as well). You HAVE to get them down by a specific date, both so that they don’t become a fire hazard or drop all their needles into the carpet, and (in some communities) so that they’ll actually be picked up by trash collection. I found that no matter how timely we were in getting the tree down, there were ALWAYS needles in the carpet, waiting for months to stab me when I was foolish enough to walk around in stocking feet. **I don’t miss any of these elements of having a real tree!!!**
The one great element of a real tree that a fake tree can never surpass is the scent. This adds greatly to the tree’s presence. I don’t know if you can pull off the over-the-top pseudo-Victorian tree situation that I remember from when I was 12 or 13 if you don’t have a real tree, because the scent of plastic in the air makes the whole thing depressingly inauthentic.
So – for sense memory and splendidness, a real tree. For a Christmas celebration that actually fits into my real life without stressing everyone out, a fake tree every time.