Embrace the beauty of the Scandi style this holiday season and use your outdoor space to design a festive Christmas bottle project with evergreens, pinecones, twine, and firelight. Bring a truly cozy feel to your porch with this Scandinavian Outdoor DIY Christmas Bottle.
Outdoor Scandinavian decor comprises fairy tale red homes with blue doors. Surrounded by gobs of snow, shining stars, outdoor fires, and minimalism. If anyone knows how to decorate for a long, cozy winter, it is our Nordic friends. Every year about this time, I always turn to their Instagram accounts for all the inspiration. See more in the Homes in Sweden | My 10 Favorite post.
DIY Christmas Bottle Design
I first came across these Christmas bottles on Lavendale’s Blog. The bottles are old wine jugs that Scandinavians embrace into their outdoor and indoor holiday decor by adding greenery and pinecones, tied up with twine, and topped off with a Northern Lights candle bottelabra.
What a fantastic way to add a bit of Scandinavian outdoors to your winter holidays.
Christmas Bottle Materials You Will Need:
*When choosing your bottle, be sure the bottleneck is level, or the Candle Bottelabra will not sit flat. I made this mistake with my first bottle, which had a slanted bottleneck…
Here’s a Christmas bottle that I will be using today to make my Scandinavian outdoor bottle for our holiday front porch to share with you.
You may also enjoy the Experience The Joy Of 12 Days Of Christmas Decorations post.
The first Scandinavian outdoor DIY Christmas bottle that I made was actually for an indoor cozy corner during the Thanksgiving holiday with some supermarket greens. It was so easy to make it excited me to get to our home in Maine to make some more of these with my mother’s antique wine jugs.
This Scandinavian Christmas bottle design is so simple it takes less than 10 minutes to make. My kind of DIY with a major holiday impact!
Step 1:
Start by wrapping the twine around the neck of the bottle and tie a tight knot. You could also use ribbon or yarn too if you like. Not all bottlenecks are the same, so you may have to improvise depending on your bottleneck’s length and size.
Step 2:
Wrap the twine around the bottleneck as often as you like, creating about a 1″ twine wrap around the bottleneck. This will add charm as well as hide the knot.
Step 3:
Choose your greens and cut them accordingly to fit the way you like on your bottle. You don’t need a lot of evergreen branches. I used about four small branches.
Hold the evergreen branches over the wrapped bottleneck twine and wrap the twine again over the evergreen branches as often as possible to cover them as best you can. Some branches will remain protruding.
Tie a final knot with the twine and tuck it into the wrapped bottleneck twine.
Step 4:
Add the pinecones to the Scandinavian Christmas bottle. I used two sets of three pinecones with a wired end that could stick inside the twine where the branches protrude. If your pinecones don’t have an attached wire, you’ll need to add one to the pinecones yourself.
Step 5
Top off your Scandinavian outdoor bottle with the Northern Lights Bottelabra Taper Holder and a candle of your choice. I’m using simple white candle tapers for the holidays.
You may also enjoy these Scandinavian Spring Homes When Less is More and 10 Dreamy Scandinavian Summer Cottages posts while we’re indulging in all things Scandinavian.
Now, I’m off to Maine for the Thanksgiving holiday. I have some really fabulous Christmas bottles there that I can’t wait to replicate the same concept with.
But of course, after arriving back in Maine, my plans changed a bit…
Vintage Demijohn Bottles
And that’s where “Thrifting with the Gals” comes in…
Over the Thanksgiving weekend in Maine, I scored two vintage demijohn bottles for just $20 each. Do you remember seeing my friend Kelly of The Tattered Pew’s collection last week in her Vintage Wicker Demijohn Decor Ideas and Where to Buy Them post? I was so inspired, as I never come across these fabulous bottles. And if I do, they’re well over $100. So I was very excited to find these two demijohns in my most recent vintage haul for just $20.
See more of this thrifted buggies go-kart today, all decorated for Christmas in the Christmas Buggies & Go Karts Decoration Ideas: Get Creative & Enjoy The Ride! post.
What is a demijohn?
Demijohns are large vessels for fermenting wine, cider, and mead. They are often made from thick glass or bottles and wrapped in wicker for an extra layer of protection during transport. Today, they are mostly used as collectibles and displayed in homes and shops throughout the U.S.
Although French in nature, I thought the demijohns would look beautifully decorated with this Scandinavian Christmas bottle design.
I also picked up a few robust, harvested Maine winterberry branches from a local farmstand, which I thought would add a colorful touch of holiday magic to the demijohns.
Here is where I added one fresh winterberry branch with two small evergreen branches and wrapped them, each with a thick rope. I felt the rope matched the demijohn bottle’s character more than the twine would.
Similarly, I wired in pine cones and topped off each demijohn bottle with the Candle Bottelabra and a white candle taper.
Nestled into an old sheepskin that tops off one of our porch’s side tables, another fun tip from our Nordic friends…
An outdoor coffee table display during a morning sunrise in the mountains shows off the demijohn’s natural beauty.
And these DIY Christmas bottle projects of Swedish homes aren’t just for the outdoors.
Here, I created a cozy corner nook with a round table to host my newly decorated demijohn Christmas bottles and more.
You may also enjoy the How to Decorate with Old Musical Instruments and How to Decorate Bookshelves for a Vintage Christmas posts.
Now all we need is a little Christmas snow, please.
You may also enjoy visiting my Vintage Ski Lodge Decoration Series.
I’m so glad you dropped by, and if you are new to my blog, welcome! I hope you enjoyed your visit with us today at our Home in Vermont.
Be sure to check out our Home in Coastal Maine, too, where we spend summers and weekends when we are craving a walk on the beach or a visit with old friends.
I’ve created the above custom pin just for this post! Hearing from you makes my day; your comments mean so much! Please join me over on Instagram and Pinterest to see more!
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Hi Ann! I love this idea! I might whip a few of these up myself. Maybe with some dried orange slices to go in my kitchen! Never heard of a “bottlebra”, ha!
They’d be so cute in your home Molly. Can’t wait to see what you do!
I adore your ideas with the Demi-John and will be transforming mine today! I think I already have a candle holder that will fit. Thanks so much for sharing this and I can hardly wait to see how you decorate with your new go-kart! It’s the cutest! Merry Christmas
Aww I love it, thanks so much Cindy. I’m decorating and blogging all about the go kart right now as it pours rain outside. A perfect Sunday activity. You’re the best, thanks Cindy!
So simple but very festive. I love your posts and look forward to them.
Thank you so much Carol, that’s so sweet of you to say. Happy Holidays!
Ann I love this idea your bottles turned out so pretty! I will be ordering g some of those candle holders for mine now! And great find on your demijohn bottles, $20 is a steal. Pinning this and wishing you a Merry Christmas!
Thanks for the inspiration Kelly. I know, a total steal, I was so psyched. Now to find more, haha. Happy Holidays Kelly!
Ann
I love this idea. So simple but stunning.
Thanks so much Rachel, I’ve been making so many of them, haha.