This past weekend, Mr. G, honey and I made our annual trek to the Gardiner Museum for their Twelve Trees of Christmas exhibition. The Gardiner Museum of ceramic arts sits across the street from the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto’s Yorkville district. I have a passion for the ceramic arts, and we have visited this museum many times over the years, dragging along as many unsuspecting friends as we could.

Each year, the twelve trees are created by some of our top designers and on a specific theme. This year, it was Christmas Presents, Past and Future. The trees were sponsored by donors who donated the trees to charities of their choice after the exhibition finished.

We arrived on the last day.

Because it’s Hump Day, and we all need to get past that, I’m sharing some of the highlights of the day with you.

A Child’s Christmas in Wales ~ Susan Taylor of Susan Taylor Interior Design and Katherine Burke of Katherine Burke Design

Ho Ho Haute Couture ~ Camal Pirbhai and Melissa Walsh Gorton of Reid & Lyons

I think of it as the Chanel tree. It might have been my favorite.

It’s a Pink Time of Year ~ Karen King, Robert King and Jasmine King-Niit of Norma King Design Inc.

Glamour – Art Deco ~ Julia West and Isabella Dabrowiecki of Julia West Home

Rekindle ~ SPARLING Landscape Architects in association with Ellen Harrington Design

This may be my favorite, too! It calls to something in me.

Treeless Christmas ~ Rania Ismail and Glen Peloso of Glen Peloso Interiors

This will ever remain in my brain as the Touch Me Tree. For the tech geek in all of us — the digital Christmas tree. If you took your hand and swirled it across the screen, the ornaments popped out and moved around the tree. Oh, my. It was the best sooc shot I could get with a large bank of floor-to-ceiling windows/doors behind me.

That’s six of the twelve. They were absolutely delicious.

Oh, the lucky recipients of these trees.

Happy Hump Day!

Elen