Beebe Cline, White Rock Realtor

Winter containers can do a lot for a home and garden, adding interest to sleepy landscapes and creating a festive atmosphere outside. While you have a lot of options when it comes to seasonal arrangements, we’re focusing on high-impact design ideas that could work for a range of containers. Some require only nestling in a couple of holiday baubles or hanging an evergreen swag, while others are more involved. But all 10 arrangements featured here are sure to inspire some holiday cheer.

1. Full-On Foliage

Mass planting is a common landscape design practice, so consider taking the same approach with your containers. Instead of placing individual stems throughout the arrangement, clump a few foliage types in each pot. Not only will you create a dramatic design, but you’ll also make the arranging process easier on yourself.

“Fewer selections with different habits achieve [the] strength of mass and big color,” says Bill Chorvat, maintenance division manager at Hursthouse Landscape Architects and Contractors in Bolingbrook, Illinois. In the winter container seen here, Chorvat used curly willow, Fraser fir, magnolia tips, silver dollar eucalyptus and red-seeded eucalyptus.

Tips: Hardy fir, spruce and juniper cuttings will provide long-lasting beauty over the winter. For contrasting foliage texture and color, look to resilient eucalyptus and magnolia leaves.

2. Holiday Baubles

Clipped conifer branches are the supporting act in this vignette by Oklahoma firm Adorn. A foliage base supports an assortment of holiday ornaments, preserved moss balls and grapevine balls. You can personalize a similar design via your ornament color selections, sticking with traditional holiday hues or going with something more neutral to extend the design further into the season. The classic containers and lantern shown here create an elegant starting point.
Hursthouse Landscape Architects and Contractors
3. Whimsical Lighting

Outdoor lighting elevates any container design, particularly if it features bare stems, such as dogwood or curly willow, as seen in this design by Hursthouse Landscape Architects and Contractors. “The small stake light delivers an extra-strong emphasis for the entrance at night,” Chorvat says.

You can choose plug-in or battery-powered spotlights or string lights to illuminate your design, using evergreen top-dressing to conceal the cords.

4. Dressed-Up Evergreens

Holiday swags made of evergreen cuttings and decorative red berries can dress up existing outdoor containers and give them a festive punch. Tuck ornaments, pine cones (as shown in these containers by Adorn) or other holiday elements around the base of the potted plant for even more seasonal pizazz.

5. High-Contrast Composition

For Chorvat, creating contrast is key for designing containers. “I always try to go with contrast. If the house is light, I go dark,” he says, emphasizing that the stems should stand out against their backdrop. Notice how the yellow twig dogwood stems and merlot eucalyptus branches cut through this arrangement’s mostly green composition, creating a layer that pops against the brick wall behind.

Chorvat follows the same philosophy regarding how the container and foliage will interact. Here you can see how the light-colored container forms a backdrop to the arching silver dollar eucalyptus, fir and cedar cuttings.

6. Silver Sparkles

Magnolia leaves, evergreen branches and bell cups (available at florists and craft stores) create a stylish base for this container in New York by The Inspired Garden. Pops of silver from the painted lotus pods, berry baubles and carefully placed decorative bird in the background give the design a personalized look that will still be timely and celebratory in the new year.

Designer Laura Janney, who created this container, says she’ll often use white to stand out against a dark house or backdrop, with gold and silver accents adding a festive sparkle. “People should have fun with it. Little birds are so cute. I think [the design] can really reflect your personality,” she says.

7. Natural Accents

To add a colorful accent while still maintaining a natural feel, look to dried natural materials. Janney says she especially likes using dried pomegranates and lotus pods, as seen in her design here, as they pop against evergreen foliage, are long-lasting and won’t feel out of place once the holidays have passed. Glue pomegranates onto floral sticks and place them where you like.

8. Bare Birch Branches

With a few festive touches, this window box arrangement by Hursthouse Landscape Architects and Contractors has gone from standard to standout. Fraser fir cuttings form the base, while dried mintolla balls (available at florists and craft stores) are nestled throughout the foliage. Small clusters of birch branches project up like pillar candles, adding beautiful contrasting color and texture. Though distinctly seasonal, this arrangement could easily extend into the new year.

9. Beautiful Birds

Even with just the foliage, this wintry container by Haute Botanics in Chicago would be gorgeous. Layers of silver bell eucalyptus stems, magnolia leaves and conifer branches create an elegant, understated design. But add the three perched red cardinals (which also happen to be Illinois’ state bird) and you’ve got a high-impact holiday container that can’t help but put a smile on your face — and they also add seasonal color.

10. Branch-and-Berry Ring

Here we see another evergreen potted shrub transformed into a high-impact holiday container with just a few seasonal ingredients. In this arrangement by Burke Brothers Landscape Design/Build, a ring of conifer branches and red berry branches encircles the shrub’s base.

You can use fresh berry branches, but the pros we spoke with said they often turn to artificial stems to extend the container’s longevity. (Otherwise, the berries will dry and fall off or be eaten by birds in a day or so — and natural branches are very expensive.)