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Top tables
Winter foliage and berries from the Highclere grounds make for a fabulous festive table, says the Countess
Given the number of rooms in the Castle, we have to make practical choices about which ones we’ll decorate. We’ve also found it’s better to have a theme so it all hangs together.
The Saloon at Highclere is the heart of the house and its sheer size dictates that it is the location for the main Christmas tree, while a smaller one goes in the Library.
Candles are scattered throughout the Castle and garlands are wound around mantelpieces, the table is set, clusters of poinsettias are positioned on the tables in the Gallery, and holly is trimmed and put in rows of vases. As the Christmas cards arrive they are set on the grand piano, on tables, or – adopting my mother’s tradition – hung on lengths of ribbon and strung up around the bookshelves.
Happily wrapped in a scarf and coat, with a bevy of dogs running around, I usually set out on 2 December, the day after the main tree is erected, in search of foliage and berries that can more provide texture and colour for our Christmas public opening.
Highclere’s winter garden, fields and hedgerows offer an abundance of choice – I normally collect a good haul of evergreen winter box, cornus, viburnum, dogwood and unpruned hydrangea heads, along with pine cones and stems of long grasses. Holly is lovely too but the berries are poisonous for humans – as well as pets – so it’s unsuitable for table decorations.
As children, my sisters and I would spray paint long broken twigs gold and silver, making a terrible mess. Nevertheless, they can look rather good and can be used to hang baubles on, while moss will disguise the trappings needed to hold them upright. Anything I find that is wet from the weather can be stored in
the Beaters’ room or the old garages to dry until needed.
Ivy covers the remains of an old church to the west side of the house and it looks fabulous when mixed with yew sprigs to create a dark background for our arrangements on mantelpieces and staircases.
Globes of mistletoe hang in profusion on the west side of the Castle, too. They are usually tantalisingly out of reach but I have found that if I clamber onto the bonnet of a high 4x4 car I can, in fact, reach some of it. My son, Edward, worried for my wellbeing, kindly asks me to ensure that someone is with me on these forays. My husband, Geordie, asks after the condition of the car bonnet…
Highclere’s Dining Room, hung in yellow silks, with huge important portraits, is very much a statement in itself so how to decorate it at Christmas time needs careful thought. Early in December I create an evergreen
decoration on the mantelpiece that will last a month, set with cream pillar candles, bowls of artificial flowers and a garland of trailing ivy and pine cones. The table and sideboard will be decorated with fresh flowers and foliage so these must wait until just before Christmas or they will wilt.
At Christmas time, we also enjoy the glorious sweet scents of hyacinths and paperwhite narcissi, which we plant with care in the early autumn.
Christmas Day breakfast is a spoiling affair, with scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, warming porridge, toast and copious cups of tea and coffee. As the meal finishes, the house party slowly gears up to brave the cold morning air and the Christmas morning church service. Our day resumes after church with drinks in the Saloon around the fire. As we are called in to lunch and take our places around the dining table, the delicious smells of turkey and assorted dishes settle the children to the focused business of eating. The gleaming Dining
Room table can hardly be seen under the piles of crackers, extravagant flowers and silver ornaments, a present in front of each place, immaculate napkins folded in the shape of a bishop’s mitre, a promising collection of glasses laid out as well as salt cellars and dishes of cranberry sauce.
Table crackers have become an integral part of Christmas Day dining, and our mother would go to great lengths to get the ones that contained numbered whistles, to be played in sequence. I have found myself doing the same and remember one hilarious post-lunch ‘concert’ where we tooted our whistles in turn to create well-known carols. I’m not sure I recognised any of the carols as they were punctuated with much laughter, and ‘No 5’ (me) missing her cue rather a lot.
Once lunch has been eaten, crackers pulled and toasts made, we abandon the Dining Room – the table covered in paper hats, wrapping paper, empty plates and mostly drunk wine – and retire to my messy study to watch the Queen’s Christmas message.