How To Decorate Your Bedroom For Christmas: 14 Festive Ideas

If you want to make your bedroom feel more Christmassy, where do you start? Festive bedding, a little tree, or full grotto? These 14 ideas have you covered.

The living room usually gets the big tree, the presents and most of the attention. But there’s something especially nice about bringing Christmas upstairs too. It’s the little tree you see when you first wake up, the bedding that only comes out once a year and those familiar decorations waiting for you at the end of a cold December day.

And because it’s your bedroom, you can make it as understated or wonderfully Christmassy as you like. It doesn’t need to impress the relatives or match whatever’s happening downstairs. It just needs to make you smile when you walk through the door.

And no, that doesn’t automatically mean covering every available surface in tinsel.

Unless you want to.

1. Decide How Christmassy You Want To Go

Some bedrooms only need a festive duvet, a few warm lights and maybe one little tree before December has very clearly arrived. Others have been waiting eleven months for permission to bring out the bows, garlands, novelty cushions and enough decorations to make the bedside table nervous.

Neither approach is more correct than the other. It’s worth deciding roughly where you sit before you start, though, because “I’m just adding a few festive touches” can escalate surprisingly quickly when every nice Christmas thing you own is suddenly looking for a home.

Your bedroom is also one of the few places where you can be a little selfish with the decorating. If the main tree downstairs has become a carefully negotiated family project, this is where the multicoloured childhood bauble, slightly battered snow globe and inexplicably beloved felt reindeer can finally have their moment.

2. Work With The Colours You Already Love

Christmas isn’t contractually obliged to be red and green. If those colours already work with your bedroom, lovely; if they don’t, there’s no reason to make everything else in the room fight with them until January.

Warm neutrals sit beautifully with deep green, burgundy and natural wood, while pale bedrooms can take softer greenery, warm white and touches of gold. If your room is pink, blue, purple or gloriously colourful already, carry that personality into your Christmas bedroom decor.

You can bring in newer ideas without rebuilding the whole bedroom around them, too. Pick one or two details you genuinely like from this year's Christmas decor trends and let the rest of the room remain recognisably yours.

3. Let Christmas Bedding Do Most Of The Heavy Lifting

The bed is normally the biggest thing in the room, so changing what’s on it can make everything feel Christmassy before you’ve hung a single decoration. It’s also one of the easiest changes to undo in January, which future-you may appreciate.

Christmas bedding can go full Slade and practically shout “IT’S CHRISTMASSS!” from every pillowcase with tartan, trees and playful prints, or you can keep things quieter with winter foliage, embroidery and softer seasonal colours.

There’s something satisfying about bedding that only comes out once a year, too. You forget about it completely, find it again at the back of the cupboard and suddenly putting it on the bed feels like one of those small household signs that Christmas has properly started.

If the duvet already has plenty going on, let it have its moment rather than making everything around it compete for attention. If it’s simpler, that’s when the cushions, throw and decorations can start doing a little more of the festive work.

4. Keep A Throw Ready For Proper December Evenings

A Christmas throw folded decoratively across the bottom of the bed brings in another colour or texture, but by mid-December it usually stops being styling and starts becoming part of the winter evening survival kit.

Pull it over your legs while you’re reading, watching a Christmas film in bed or working your way through whatever festive series you’ve decided now counts as an annual tradition. Once it’s dark before tea and getting back up to turn the heating up feels like an unreasonable request, it starts earning its place very quickly.

If your duvet is heavily patterned, a plain throw can settle things down. With simpler bedding, tartan, stripes or a richer festive colour can add more Christmas without asking you to change anything else.

5. Add Christmas Cushions Until You Find Your Limit

A couple of Christmas cushions can make everyday bedding feel festive without replacing the whole setup. You might want one statement design in front of your usual pillows, or a few different textures and prints if December is when your inner cushion maximalist gets to come out.

There’s no magic number, and we’re not going to tell you that three cushions is tasteful while four represents moral decline. The real test happens at bedtime, when every decorative cushion needs somewhere to go and tired-you meets the decisions made by daytime-you.

If half the collection ends up on the floor every evening, you’ve probably found your limit.

6. Give Your Bedroom Its Own Christmas Tree

A bedroom tree doesn’t need to compete with the one downstairs. A small potted tree can sit happily on a dresser in a smaller bedroom, while a slim Christmas tree gives you the height and twinkly-light effect without taking possession of an entire corner. For more help, we’ve got you covered with our Christmas tree buying guide.

The best bit is that this tree can be much more personal. Use it for the ornament you made at school, the souvenir you picked up on holiday, the strange little decoration you bought because it made you laugh, or the slightly wonky one somebody gave you years ago yet you still look forward to unpacking.

A few favourite Christmas tree decorations that never quite fit the downstairs colour scheme can finally get their moment here, too. The main tree can have a theme; this one can have lore.

7. Let Shelves And Dressers Join In

A few smaller decorations grouped amongst the things already there usually feel warmer and more personal than clearing everything away and rebuilding the shelf as a miniature Christmas shop.

Try putting a little festive house beside your books, tucking an ornament between framed photos or bringing out an old Christmas card you kept because somebody wrote something inside that was worth keeping. Those small combinations are what stop seasonal decorating feeling detached from the rest of your life.

Just show a little restraint around the bedside table. However charming the miniature Christmas village looks at three in the afternoon, your phone, glasses, book and glass of water will all be returning later and expecting their usual territory.

8. Decorate The Headboard, Not Your Head

A garland around the headboard can make the whole bed feel properly festive without taking up another inch of floor space. Something from our wreaths and garlands range can be left fairly simple, dressed with ribbon or given a few lightweight decorations that pick up colours from the bedding.

The important bit comes once you’ve finished: actually get into bed. Lean back against the pillows, move around a little and check whether your beautiful creation is anywhere near where your head is going to be for the next month.

If something immediately catches your hair, pokes you in the shoulder or starts scattering fake snow over the pillow, adjust it now. You do not need to spend December being quietly bullied by a garland.

9. Give The Window A Little Christmas Attention

Windows are useful Christmas decorating space because they can make quite a big difference without asking you to give up any floor or furniture. A hanging star, a small wreath or a little greenery around the frame may be all you need.

Your curtains can help pull the room together too. They don’t have to match your festive bedding exactly; picking up one colour from the duvet, throw or decorations will normally make everything feel connected without looking too coordinated.

If you’ve reached the point where you’re staring between the bed and window wondering whether they should technically match, our guide to whether your bed set should match your curtains goes into that particular decorating rabbit hole properly.

Whatever you add, make sure the curtains still close. The Christmas magic does lose something when you’re standing there in your pyjamas wrestling with a garland because you’d simply like some privacy.

10. Make The Most Of Dark December Evenings

Christmas bedroom decor really starts earning its keep after dark. A little tree glowing in the corner, a softly lit star or the warm pool of your usual bedside lamp can make an ordinary winter evening feel noticeably cosier.

You don’t need lights wrapped around every available edge. A few well-placed points of warm light usually create more atmosphere than illuminating the bedroom like Santa is trying to land a plane in it.

It’s worth thinking about how you’re going to switch everything off before you get comfortable, too. Put switches somewhere easy to reach or make use of timers where suitable, because you already know what happens otherwise: duvet up, perfect position found, one heroic Christmas star still blazing away from the other side of the room.

At that point it stops being ambience and becomes personal.

11. Use Doors, Mirrors And Wardrobes When Space Is Tight

If floor space is disappearing fast, look at what’s already standing in the room. A wreath on the bedroom door makes things feel festive before you even walk in, while a little greenery around a mirror or ribbon on wardrobe handles can add Christmas without covering another surface.

Mirrors are particularly handy because they catch nearby lights and decorations, making a fairly small amount of Christmas feel like it’s doing more. They’re essentially the colleague who somehow gets credit for everybody else’s work.

Just keep the wardrobe functional. Ribbon around the handles can look lovely and, for about thirty seconds, make the whole thing feel like an enormous Christmas present; tying both doors together so you have to unwrap your clothes every morning is less charming.

12. Bring Out The Decorations With Stories Attached

Some Christmas decorations are fashionable for a year or two. Others have survived childhood bedrooms, university flats, house moves and several completely different decorating phases while never matching a single one of them.

Those are often the ones that make Christmas feel most like Christmas.

Maybe it’s an old snow globe, a bauble someone gave you, a decoration bought on a trip or something connected to your first Christmas in a particular home. The bedroom is a lovely place to put those pieces because you’re not decorating it for whoever walks through the front door; you’re decorating the part of Christmas that’s still there when the rest of the house has gone quiet.

The slightly battered ornament you’ve had since you were little may not be the prettiest thing in the room, but seeing it again can do more than a whole box of brand-new decorations.

13. Let Kids Have Their Own Version Of Christmas

A child’s Christmas bedroom doesn’t need to look like a scaled-down version of the grown-up rooms. Let them choose some of it, whether that means their own festive bedding, a little tree, an advent calendar beside the bed or a place of honour for whatever Christmas masterpiece has come home from school that week.

When you’re little, having your own tree feels like an absurd amount of festive responsibility. Suddenly three baubles, one paper decoration and a slightly wonky star are a serious decorating scheme, and waking up to them every morning feels completely different from seeing the big family tree downstairs.

That matters more than whether the colours coordinate perfectly. If their vision involves candy canes, dinosaurs wearing Santa hats and something inexplicably neon, you may simply have entered their jurisdiction.

Keep decorations and lighting suitable for their age and follow any product instructions.

14. Remember You Still Have To Sleep In Here

This is the final test, and it’s best done when you’ve finished decorating but before you congratulate yourself too enthusiastically. Look at the room as somewhere you still need to use at eleven o’clock at night rather than something you’ve just styled.

You should be able to open the wardrobe, close the curtains, reach your bedside lamp and put down a glass of water without negotiating with a miniature Christmas village. Lights and cables shouldn’t turn the route around the bed into an obstacle course, and all those festive cushions need somewhere sensible to go when it’s actually time to sleep.

This matters even more in a smaller bedroom. Festive bedding, one or two cushions, a little tree on a dresser, something at the window and a favourite decoration or two can already make the room feel completely different without claiming every spare centimetre.

It’s worth remembering if you started the afternoon saying, “I’ll just put a couple of Christmas bits out”, and have somehow ended up standing in what appears to be a tiny Nordic forest.

The best bedroom Christmas decorating leaves enough normal bedroom underneath it. You want enough Christmas that walking into the room makes you smile, but not so much that you have to dismantle December before you can go to sleep.

Make Your Bedroom Feel Like Christmas

The nicest bedroom decor for Christmas probably won’t be the most perfectly coordinated thing you’ve ever done, and that’s part of the appeal. It’s the festive bedding you look forward to bringing back out, the little tree carrying all the odd decorations and those familiar things that somehow make an ordinary December evening feel different.

So if you’re deciding how to decorate your bedroom for Christmas, use the colours you genuinely like, give the sentimental bits somewhere they deserve to be seen and make the room festive in a way that feels like you.

Then turn off the big light, get under the duvet and enjoy it.

Find more seasonal ideas on the MFI blog, or tag us on Facebook and Instagram to show us how you’ve brought Christmas upstairs.