Housebuilder lifts a lid on storage habits as Plymouth homeowners prepare to take down Christmas decorations

The last of the turkey has been devoured and the mulled wine has been polished off – Christmas is officially over.

But with the twelfth night – the day we’re meant to take our trees down – approaching, where are people in the south west storing their Christmas decorations?

Local housebuilder Barratt Homes, which is bringing new homes to bringing new homes to Plymouth through its Redwood Heights development, has conducted a study into where people keep their festive decorations when the Yuletide season is over.

The clear winner of where most people store their Christmas decorations is the loft with 43% of votes. However, there are lots of other popular places too, including in a cupboard (13%), under the stairs (12%), in a garage (9%) and even under the bed (5%). Surprisingly, 10% of people said they don’t have any Christmas decorations that need storing.

Sara Parker, sales director at Barratt Homes said: “Storage is a really important issue for customers, particularly at this time of year with Christmas decorations needing to be put away. The results just underline how all homes should have storage built into the design to make them Christmas ready.”

It’s considered bad luck not to take your Christmas decorations down by the end of the twelfth night, however there is confusion over which day this falls on.

Some class it as January 5 as it’s the 12th day from Christmas Day. However, others count the 12 days starting from Boxing Day so consider the twelfth day to be on January 6.

According to folklore, it’s unlucky to keep your tree up after this time because tree spirits take shelter in Christmas greenery during the festive season. Once this period of time has passed, spirits need to be released back into the wild and legend says that failure to do so means greenery will not grow back leading to farming problems and food shortages.

Sara added: “We’re very proud of the gardens and green open space at our developments so we’ll be sure to have our trees down in time just in case the legend is true!”

To find out more about homes in Plymouth visit www.barratthomes.co.uk