Designer Amy Leonard’s home is always a cozy haven, but at Christmas time, it sparkles. Leonard and her husband, Rick, moved in nine years ago, when his parents were putting it up for sale. Some work had been done on the three-bedroom bungalow—adding onto the home and lifting up the ceiling in the living room—when his parents first moved in many years before. Over the years, Leonard has furnished the spaces with carefully selected pieces, inherited antiques—and a few gifts from Ingrid Leess, her longtime designer partner at Leonard + Leess Design, with whom she’s decorated quite a few homes for the holidays. “It’s a storybook house,” says Leess, “but it’s especially magical at Christmas.”
The living room’s high ceilings have space for a cathedral-height Christmas tree, and the Leonards take advantage. They start looking for their extra-tall evergreen in the first week of December, and because they have so many ornaments to display, they also get a smaller one that stands right beside it. Once the trees are home, the couple takes their time decorating. For a day or two, they enjoy the bare branches, then they add sparkling twinkle lights, and finally, they hang the ornaments.
Greenery lines the mantel and fills vases including a large white one by Frances Palmer.
The Leonards’ six-year-old Border Collie, Daisy, sits in front of the 10-foot-tall tree in the living room. The larger tree tends to get more red ornaments, and the smaller one has a snowier persona with glass objects, snowflakes and snowmen.
Leonard uses a Martha Stewart recipe for her famous gingerbread cookies, though she says she can make them in her sleep.
Cranberry and rosemary spice up these holiday cocktails, prepared in gold-rimmed glasses that belonged to Leonard’s grandmother.
Holiday décor brings some red and green to the sunroom, where a vintage Santa collection is grouped on a table from Ikea; the chair is from Crate & Barrel.
This vintage Santa was found at an antiques center; he reminded Amy Leonard of old Coca Cola advertisements.
A package of gingerbread cookies is ready to be gifted.
Decorating is an annual walk down memory lane, and the stroll gets longer every year. Each ornament is unique, and each one of them has a story. “Our ornament collection represents certain periods in our lives,” says Leonard, “almost a scrapbook of what was going on in our family or what we were interested in.” There’s the delicate Victorian paper angel from Leonard’s mom that always sits high up on the taller tree, and a yellow cab with a Christmas tree coming out of the back from the couple’s 13 years in New York. A quarter-sized wooden bird was purchased at ABC Carpet & Home the year their daughter was born. It’s so tiny that “I panic about losing it every year,” says Leonard. She likes ornaments with some quirk: A pair of small red Converse became holiday décor once Charlie, the couple’s son, outgrew them. A sock snowman was made by one of the children’s kindergarten classmates. “It cracks me up every year,” says Leonard. Hiding a handkerchief among the branches has been a tradition for generations as well.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Every ornament—from antique angels to childhood art projects—has its own story to tell.
Once the trees are done, Leonard gets to baking. Though she’s always made cookies at Christmastime, she started focusing exclusively on gingerbread for the holidays when her kids were little. It’s a gargantuan project that grows every year—she made a record 600 in 2023—and the process involves many steps. She always gets started early, making the batter at the beginning of December and refrigerating it. Then she rolls it out, cuts the dough into shape, puts her ginger-people into the oven to bake and finally, pipes each with icing. “She is a Santa’s workshop at Christmas,” laughs Leess.
Though the cookies are the stars of the season, Leonard doesn’t mind a few with crooked heads or droopy smiles. “I like the ones that aren’t perfect,” says Leonard, who often boxes them up in funny and unexpected containers—an empty tomato box from Trader Joe’s or a leftover strawberry container—and gives them to friends, family and a few lucky clients. Since she’s baking nearly around the clock, “the house always smells good too,” says Leess.
With twinkling lights and delicious smells coming from all angles, there’s not much else Leonard needs to do to make her house completely holiday ready. With fresh, fragrant wreaths and greenery from local shops, and a few Saint Nicks from her collection of vintage Santas tucked into the home’s nooks and shelves, the house is ready for another season of creating holiday memories.
