The Christmas Ball

Some walls just need one great thing, and The Christmas Ball is happy to be it. This oversized, illustrated ornament rendered in a rich green and framed as a genuine piece of holiday art stands in for a wreath or a swag of greenery in the spots where hanging anything fresh isn't practical at all this time of year.

We love the nostalgic, storybook quality of the illustration, and how much presence its scale gives a wall above a console table or beside a doorway leading into the next room over. Pair it with Vintage Christmas Greetings and the Antique-Inspired Good Tidings Plaque for a small holiday gallery wall built around a few considered pieces rather than a full matched set bought all at once from a catalog.

It arrives ready to hang with a sawtooth hanger, protected behind glass for years of being packed away and brought back out again each December without fail, rain or shine. Because the scale does so much of the visual work on its own, it never needs much dressed up around it — just a nail and a bit of open wall. A single piece that makes a whole hallway feel like the holidays have properly arrived at last.