Go dress a TREE
We need to care for and protect our trees, take them into our lives and look after them.
Trees are the lungs of our planet, breathing oxygen into the air. Without them, we would die.
Tree Dressing Day encourages the celebration of trees in the city or in the country, in the street or on the village green, in your garden or in a park.
Trees have been honoured and decorated throughout the ages, and still are in many parts of the world. And not just at Christmas time...
...and make it feel appreciated
Take Action
Go dress a tree.
Use anything you feel like: lights, big hanging numbers cut out of card, cloth, huge rosettes, objects you've collected for recycling.
You can use the decorations to put across a specific message, or just make your tree look so beautiful that people notice and appreciate it.
Find Out More
Read the "Tree Dressing Day Manual" produced by Common Ground: www.commonground.org.uk/treedress.html
See examples of tree dressing at: www.england-in-particular.info
A date for your diary: Tree Dressing Day is first full weekend in December
Tree dressing in history:
Xerxes, the famed ruler of Persia, on discovering a plane tree that he considered beautiful, is reputed to have honoured it by dressing it with jewels.
The prophet Mohammed, on his night journey along the Axis Mundi with the Archangel Gabriel as a guide, encountered a tree glowing with emeralds, rubies and sapphires, perhaps the miraculous Tuba Tree which stood at the heart of paradise.
Alexander, explorer and conqueror of ancient times, found a talking tree with the heads of animals and people growing in its branches, which rebuked him for his ambition and forewarned him of his death far from home.
At Satterthwaite in the North of England, an old oak tree by the village fountain was reported in 1889 to be dressed every year with coloured rags and also with crockery.
Tree dressing today:
In Mexico during December, pinatas (bags full of sweets) are suspended from trees as a treat for children to celebrate the bounty of the trees and the riches they provide.
In Provence, South of France, on May Day may trees (hawthorn) are decked with flowers and ribbons.
In some parts of Russia on Maundy Thursday, villagers select a young birch tree from the wood and dress it in women's clothing or with ribbons and beads.
At Chir-Ghat in India, local women, as an act of devotion, tie pieces of their clothing to the branches of the ancient tree that reputedly witnessed the appearance of the god Krishna to the cow-girls.
On the North American prairies, the Lakota, Ongala and Dakota Sioux put rags in trees as part of an ancient ritual connected with spiritual purification. Red is an offering to the sun, blue to the sky, green to the earth.
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Here's an interesting fact: In Mexico during December, pinatas (bags full of sweets) are suspended from trees as a treat for children to celebrate the bounty of the trees and the riches they provide.
And here's another: Tree Dressing Day is first full weekend in December.
Celebrate the importance of trees by decorating a tree - in your garden, in the neighbourhood, in a park. Use anything you feel like: lights, big hanging numbers cut out of card, cloth, huge rosettes, objects you've collected for recycling.
