The family tree in the beloved holiday movie A Christmas Story said all there is to say about Yuletide decorating: the tinsel- and cotton-snowdraped monstrosity, with its fuseblowing multicoloured lights and tipsy top star, was the ultimate monument to seasonal kitsch. Just like the classic comedy's Parker family, otherwiseunderstated people seem driven to excess when it comes to the holidays, decking the halls with red-and-green tartan, smirking snowman figurines, and blinking bulbs. And more power to them. But there are ways to celebrate the season without the gaudy garlands. Here, three Vancouver design mavens offer up ideas that will leave fans of the sleekly contemporary joyful and triumphant.

Colette Soros
general manager, Liberty
Soros is making this holiday a glass act. Everything from basic balls to snowflakes and candlesticks comes in the reflective, transparent material. "It's very big now, because it's really pretty and glamorous and it's great in smaller spaces," Soros says.

Elsewhere in glass are small, sparkling cathedrals to group on a mantel or coffee table: "They look like they're made of ice; they're just so clean and simple-looking." Some of Soros's favourite new pieces are tiny cones in white opaque glass. "We're putting old-fashioned candy in them and hooking them to the tree," she explains. "The cones can be personalized; you could put a beautiful lily bud sitting in water in them."

Soros also loves the silver, antiqued mercury-glass balls she's found for the store. (The local flagship recently moved to 1635 West Broadway; the two other locations are 20070 Langley By-Pass, Langley, and 1037 Marine Drive, North Vancouver.) For more colours, she searched for black and chocolate-brown glass balls- and found them in the form of bold, oversize spheres. (See this issue's cover.) Rather than hang them from a tree, she prefers to display them, all in a single hue, in a silver urn or a simple white, ceramic bowl.

Greenery brings a breath of Christmas to a room, but Soros forgoes traditional holly and faux cedar: instead, she's bringing in real boxwood wreaths-some in mod square or rectangular shapes. Take a pass on a big bow and place one of the store's exquisite, realistic baby birds in the corner. Soros also recommends one of her store's live, miniature, manicured Christmas trees. "I wouldn't even put lights on them-they're only a foot high," she says. "I'd just put them in a beautiful white planter; they are perfect for a small space."

Kelly Deck
interior designer, Simple Design Group
This season, Kelly Deck is going green-chartreuse green, that is. "It's more punchy than that old forestgreen- and-cranberry-red combination," says the designer, who's busy preparing to host episodes of the new HGTV series Take It Outside (which premieres next June). Picking a chic theme and repeating it throughout a room with simple, natural objects will keep decorations from tipping into the tacky, Deck says.

She suggests setting candles made from green tea along a long wood or marble plate in the middle of the dining table. Or display a few unripe pears-the exact hue she's so keen on.

The colour theme can be applied to the tree, with this caveat: "I have a problem with really contrived trees, so I don't think people should be deterred from putting things on the tree that remind them of, say, when their son was born. Just choose one thing that is green and repeat it all over. I might just do green bows and wire them on the ends of the branches; or I'd dust pine cones in a gold spray paint and hook them onto the bows," she enthuses, and then quickly adds with a laugh: "But I don't want to be known as crafty!"

Chartreuse can also translate into wreaths. Deck encourages people to hit the local florist to find fresh greenery that picks up on the right shade of green ("Not holly!") and have it made up into a simple ring. She would carry the theme through much more than just holiday decorations. "I'd invest in a throw that's in the colour family and cushions for your chairs," says Deck, who recently closed her Main Street boutique to run her design services through everythingsimple.com/. "That's the key to transforming the space entirely."

Deck also loves the way chartreuse can blend with other hues: inspired by a peacock feather, she likes mixing it with gold, sapphire, and brown. "Put gold grasses in a clear vase or a chocolate-brown vase," she suggests.

If green doesn't get you going, she recommends sticking to subtle metallics. "I love getting star anise and dusting them in gold spray paint. It's all sparkly but you don't lose that organic quality," says Deck, who displays the glimmering, textured seeds in a small, round "offering bowl" in ceramic or wood. Sounds contemporary and-dare we say-"crafty" all at the same time.

Heather Ross
artist/designer/owner, Heather Ross in House Atelier
Just as she is in her photography and painting, Heather Ross is inspired by nature when it comes to Christmas décor. "In general, for holiday, I always prefer a cooler palette-ice and frost and green colours. They create a more ethereal and Zen-like atmosphere. Personally, I've never been drawn to the reds," she admits. She's a huge fan of antique or reproduction mercury-glass ornaments. "I found some candlesticks, too: they have silver leaf on the inside and look like time has eroded it.

" When it comes to the vintage glass balls, she blends turquoise, olive or yellowy green, and silver, "even going into a pale violet and icy pink". Display them on a tall cake stand or tall compote bowl for dramatic effect, she suggests, or hang them from wires or ribbons from branches spraypainted white. At her South Granville store (1517 West 6th Avenue, www.heatherrossinhouse.com/), Ross displays those branches in urns or vases: "They're very Dr. Zhivago, wintry and frosty, versus the Christmas tree with the red tartan," she says. "It's a nice look for a loft or apartment." Ross also likes earthier accents: straw and moss, burlap, nests, and birds. "It's very unslick, and much more rustic and wild," she says. "In the same direction, I love a huge platter of mandarin oranges or a huge platter- maybe a bamboo platter-of pears or pomegranates."

With that in mind, Ross reveals the closest she ever comes to using the dreaded red: "I just got all these crimson pears from Capers, and I'd put them in a line down a dining-room table with votives in between. If you're entertaining or doing a dinner, people can snack on them."