How to use a beautiful ribbon for a luscious chocolate brown tablescape

Welcome to the new year and a new luscious chocolate brown tablescape!

Holiday decorating theme

I usually have a theme of sorts for my holiday decorating, and this year revolved around this gorgeous chocolate brown ribbon. (You can also see my tree and mantel if you’re so inclined!)

This table was actually our Christmas Eve dinner table, but it would work perfectly for a cozy winter dinner party.

The chocolate brown tablescape for a winter dinner party

The holidays are often really busy and we get to see lots of people, but I sometimes feel like we don’t get to spend much actual one-on-one time with our friends. So January is a time I like to have smaller dinner parties where we get to actually chat and catch up face to face.

Even though the holidays are over and most of us are looking for a fresh, uncluttered feel, there’s still a place for evergreens and a little sparkle. And this table has all that!

Let’s break down the elements that make this table so fun.

Start with white

I always think there’s nothing like white linens to freshen things up. You can dress them up or down, and they respond well to any other color, in any season! Especially if you have lots of empty space on your table, white is so restful.

And white plates, too. With a sparkly charger under them to set them off, they just add to the freshness of the table. As much as I love a tall plate stack, I set only the dinner plate because that’s all we needed. (A perfect example of the rule that you put only what you actually need on the table!)

Adding the beautiful brown ribbon

I loved all the white, of course, but maybe it needed a little something to cut the glare, as it were! Enter the beautiful chocolate brown ribbon! The plates were a little stark, so I just put a little bit of ribbon behind each place card.

This particular arrangement looked a little like a medal or prize ribbon to me. But I was actually running out of time, so I went with it anyway. If I’d thought about it more ahead of time, or had a little longer to mess around with it, I would have made the ribbon thinner and done something a little more elegant with it.

But I got the general look I was after, and it worked just fine. Another example of not getting overwhelmed by the idea of perfection! I ended up putting a little sprig of fresh rosemary with the place card, and that helped too.

The guests loved it, btw, and thought I’d hit the nail on the head!

Chocolate brown tablescape centerpiece

And finally, the centerpiece for our luscious chocolate brown tablescape. I started with just the chocolate ribbon, and tied a little bow in the middle to make it match our theme. All our presents had been wrapped in white with chocolate brown bows, so it totally carried that theme through to dinner.

Even with all that warm gold, I thought the table looked a little stark, notwithstanding the lovely ribbon and bow. So I went out into the yard (which I do all the time. Here’s another totally different example,) and picked a few yew sprigs to use as a garland.

I think of greenery as a neutral, and the boughs warmed up the table and gave it some extra interest too.

Surprise Blessings

While I was out there, I found two brave yellow roses struggling to survive in the cold of December! They weren’t going to make it through the windy night, so I brought them in and let them have their final moments celebrating with us at the table.

If I hadn’t been so sympathetic to them, I would have left the table with only the greenery or a few faux white roses – just for purely aesthetic reasons. In my opinion, the yellow adds an extra focal point that didn’t really match the vibe I had going on.

But sometimes, love overcomes design, and we were all grateful that we had these courageous and beautiful reminders of the goodness all around us! Even in the midst of winter.

The final place setting

So here’s a view of the final place setting at our chocolate brown tablescape. The white made it fresh, the gold warmed it up, the luscious ribbon made it rich, and the candlelight and crystal made it sparkle. Not to mention the greenery that evoked the winter season.

With just a few gold accents, some ribbon, and some greenery, you can personalize this basic idea for your warm, fresh, and sparkly dinner parties this winter!

Let me know what you think in the Comments below, and as always, I’ll give you my boutique shopping recommendations if you want to add any of these to your table.

Also remember to pin! Pinterest is loving us these days, and we want to keep the momentum going!

Thanks so much for being here, and Happy Tablescaping!

Barbara’s Boutique Recommendations

Click on the pictures below for links to the pieces I mentioned in this post. If something’s not available, I chose a similar replacement.

This post includes affiliate links for your shopping convenience. If you click on a link and end up buying anything from that site within 24 hours, I get a small commission with no extra cost to you. It’s a Win-Win, and helps cover the cost of publishing Mantel and Table. (You can read the whole disclosure policy here.) Thanks so much for shopping with me!

And remember, a portion of anything you buy from MANTELandTABLE.com goes to Habitat for Humanity and Proud Ground. With our purchases, we get to help people build homes for their own mantels and tables!

Pin the chocolate brown tablescape for later!

This Post Shared With

• Tablescape Thursday 01.09.25 – Hosted by Between Naps on the Porch
• Tuesday Turn About 01.14.25 – Hosted by My Wee Abode