The Brief
Walk into Adyen's Toronto office in December and the first thing you meet is the reception desk: pale oak, the green logo, and a garland running the whole length of it.
We already look after the live plants in this office. So when the workplace team asked us to dress it for the season, we weren't working from a photo of somebody else's lobby. We were working from a room we knew — which corners get the afternoon light, which shelf already has a Sansevieria on it, where people actually stand.
That head start matters more than it sounds. Holiday decor goes wrong when it ignores the room it lands in — when the ornaments are lovely on their own and wrong against the wall behind them. The brief here was the opposite: make the office feel like December, and make it still look like Adyen's office.
Blue, Burlap and Pine Cones
Most office holiday decor arrives in one of two flavours: red and green, or silver and white. Neither would have looked right here.
So we built the palette out of the office instead. Deep blue glass baubles lead it. Burlap ribbon and pine cones carry the warm tones of the oak millwork. Red berry picks are the one bright note, used sparingly — enough to keep the whole thing from going cold, not enough to turn it traditional.
Blue is what keeps it modern instead of traditional. That was the deliberate choice, and it's the reason the reception desk looks dressed rather than decorated.
What Went In
- A 7.5-foot artificial tree wrapped in burlap ribbon, warm lights and pine cones, by the floor-to-ceiling windows
- Lit garlands along the reception desk and along a divider in the open office
- Greenery run through the workstation shelving, beside the live plants we already service
- Blue baubles, cones and red berries worked through all of it
Everything indoors is premium artificial. Nothing browns, nothing sheds on the carpet, and no one on the workplace team has to water it or fuss over it.
Decor That Knows the Room
The reason this works isn't the ornaments. It's that the garland on the workstation shelving sits right beside a snake plant we've been pruning all year. The tree stands next to a live ficus. Nothing looks airlifted in.
That only happens when the people planning the decor are the same people who know the plants. We weren't guessing at the palette or the placements — we'd been standing in those rooms every couple of weeks all year.
You can read about the live plant program we run at this office, and the artificial ceiling planter we built for the café, in their own case studies.
Want your office to feel like this in December — without anyone on your team spending an afternoon up a ladder? Have a look at our holiday decor packages. We design it, install it, and take it all away again after the season.