Are Wreaths Only a Holiday Thing?

The first wreaths didn't go on doors. They went on heads.

At the ancient Olympic Games, winners were crowned with olive. At Delphi, it was laurel. The circle meant honor, and the plant said where you'd earned it. Rome borrowed the idea and crowned generals returning in triumph with laurel. Wealthy families even had wreaths made of gold, delicate enough to be buried with the dead.

For most of history, a wreath was a way of saying: this person matters.

Winter green. Separately, and long before anyone called it Christmas decor, people in northern Europe brought evergreens inside in midwinter. Holly, ivy, fir. When everything else was bare, the things that stayed green were a promise that spring would come back. A circle, with no beginning and no end, fit that idea well. Over time, the two traditions met.

The candles. The Advent wreath has a surprisingly specific origin. In 1839, Johann Hinrich Wichern, a pastor running a home for poor children in Hamburg, got tired of being asked how many days were left until Christmas. He mounted candles on an old cartwheel and lit one each day. The design spread, the candles came down to four, one for each Sunday of Advent, and the wheel turned green.

The door. From there, the wreath moved outside to the front door, where most of us know it now.

So, is a wreath only a holiday thing? Not historically. A wreath has meant victory, honor, memory and the return of spring. We happen to make ours for the one season when it means all of them at once, and for the one place people see it every day.

Which may be why it works as a client gift. It's a very old way of saying: you matter.

If that's the message you want to send this year, tell me a little about your list and grab fifteen minutes with me.

Jonah, founder, wreath.co