For many recent years in the weeks leading up to Christmas, Americans have increasingly considered and purchased ‘fake’ Christmas trees due to the perceived environmental advantage as well as the cost savings and the overall convenience.
When it comes to ‘pros and cons’ here are the highlights:
The big 4 ‘Fake’ Tree Advantages:
- The technology has increased to make them look pretty real.
(Disadvantage – They do not have the real tree smell.) - They often come pre-lit and easily unfold like an umbrella.
(Disadvantage – The family ritual and memories generated from setting the tree stand and lighting the tree are lost.) - They do not dry up and lose their needles, and they are easy to fold up and pack away.
- They pay for themselves over a few years since the cost of real trees has increased.
The big 4 ‘Real’ Tree Advantages:
- People get to enjoy all of the great sensory experiences like scent that come along with a natural tree.
- They are not creating an adverse impact on the environment when it comes to the petrol based products used for fake trees and the shipping fuel incurred to transport them, often from overseas.
(Disadvantage – Diesel fuel is still used to ship the real trees in trucks.) - Most Christmas Trees are grown on farms so the harvesting does not create a massive environmental downside like clear cutting.
(Disadvantage – The land could be used to grow something that is more efficient than a tree over eight years that is used for only a month and then discarded.) - There are an increasing number of options to recycle the trees into mulch if the homeowner takes the initiative.
Given the disadvantages of either option, is there a better way?
On a trip to one of the big box home improvement stores two weeks before Christmas, a Pennsylvania man and his family found a solution. The Szoradi family first looked at live trees as an option thinking that they would buy one in a root ball and then transplant it in their yard as soon as the ground thawed in the early spring. The problem is that the live trees on hand in the middle of the winter are rarely more than a few feet tall.
The Inspiration:
As the family rolled their cart through the store out into the seasonal section, Mr. Szoradi noticed that the ‘bailing’ process posed an opportunity. To get the real trees up on the roof of the cars and SUVs, the staff at the store would run the trees through the typical netting disc that holds the branches in place. This process inevitably snapped off a few of the smaller branches which the staff tossed into trash bins.
So, Mr. Szoradi pitched his wife, “We can make a tree that has the real tree smell without having to actually cut down a tree. Why not RE-USE the discards of the Christmas Tree process as the building blocks for an Eco Friendly tree?” The question then became how to create an armature that would hold the clippings. This particular home improvement store happened to have a sale on the final few trellis work pieces at $10 each. The trellis pieces were shaped like a triangle, so that when four were connected at the top (narrow end) the armature would make a ‘pyramid’ that appeared almost conical. Mr. Szoradi explained that the staff was very helpful and tested with him a five part approach as well as the four piece strategy to give it even more of conical appearance, but Mrs. Szoradi gave the go on the four piece structure. So, $40 later and two trash bags filled with tree clippings, the Szoradi family headed home.
The Construction:
Back at the house, the lattice work pyramid sitting on the floor apparently did not have the proper impact, so Mr. Szoradi said that he found a table with a single center leg to use as the stand. This stand would not only elevate the tree but also create room below for the gifts. The whole assembly took just four screws at the top to connect, and then a quick rummage through the basement to find a left over piece of window trim to use as the vertical support at the very top. Mr. Szoradi has proudly said, “The whole assembly stacks flat when unscrewed and it is no thicker than four inches.”
The Lighting and Ornamentation:
The lighting for the Eco Tree is the key to the night time illumination as well as the infrastructure to hold the evergreen foliage. The typical lights that wrap this or any tree have multiple wires, so the Szoradi’s used the gaps between the wire strands to hold the mini branches. Instead of just stuffing any branches in the wire openings, they clipped the three pronged end pieces from each of the RE-USED foliage to represent the Holy Trinity. Since pine trees in general often have central spine growth with flanking branches, this was not a stretch to find the three part green ‘ornaments’ that abound.
More Symbolism:
The Szoradi family took the nativity ‘manger’ scene that was a family hand-me-down and placed it over a bed of evergreen foliage on the table inside the tree structure so that it would be elevated above the gifts that would end up below. Mr. Szoradi said, “At least this way, the whole spiritual reason for Christmas, as the celebration of the birth of Jesus is elevated above the retail ritual.” The tree also includes an illuminated hanging Star of David over the manger, and from the inside, the tree lights create a night sky planetarium effect for the miniature family.
Personalization:
The Szoradi’s youngest member added to the new tree by including a recent class project picture of a Polar Bear that he placed next to the miniature likeness of a Santa Claus, because “polar bears live up near Santa”. He also made a yellow illustration of what he calls “our solar panels” that take the suns energy and convert it into the electricity to power the light of the tree.
The Szoradi family continues to decorate their Eco Tree while they live in one of the most energy efficient solar homes in America. As the featured home on GREENandSAVE.com, they have taken Green Home Remodeling to heart, even when it comes to a rethinking a…Christmas Tree.
