Holiday Entertaining Tips From Home Designer Kim Seybert - Stylehive

Between Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Eve, the holidays are packed with reasons to have a party. Stressed about what your going to do and how your going to get it done? Kim Seybert, entertaining expert and designer of chic tableware accessories is here to help. She gave me the scoop on her top 5 holiday entertaining tips to share with the Hive!

Make sure you enjoy your own dinner party. For Thanksgiving or Christmas this means hiring some help or enlisting a family member or two to help with the set up. Make sure to prepare as much of your menu in advance as well setting your table the night before. You don't want to be stuck in the kitchen instead of spending time with your guests.

Since there is usually so much food on the table for the Thanksgiving or Christmas meal, keep your centerpieces (flowers, candles, etc) simple. Let your turkey be the center of attention. Flowers should be below eye level so they don't block the view and the flow of conversation. Instead of one big decoration for the Thanksgiving table, I recommend smaller arrangements down the table. This is also a great holiday to use fruit and vegetables as a centerpiece.

If you find you have 16 guests and china for 12...mix it up. Combining a set of china with pattern back to a set of white dishes is easy and has a carefree fun feel. You can also mix your formal china with pieces from your more casual dinnerware.

A holiday meal is a good time to use a tablecloth and placemats. The tablecloth will help protect your table and placemats on top of the table cloth to add a pop color. Try a burnt orange capiz shell placemats on top of an ivory table cloth. These placemats make clean up simple, since they can be wiped down easily. I love using a gold or brown napkin to create an autumnal looking table.

Place a Polaroid camera at each place setting so guests can take photos and have a memento from the party to take home with them.

About Kim Seybert:
Kim Seybert offers fashionable tabletop accessories inspired by the latest runway trends. She uses her refined fashion sensibility and a love of rich color and texture to create a stylish collection for modern living. See her collections at her East Hampton store and online at kimseybert.com and are available at specialty retail stores such as Barneys, Bergdorf Goodman, Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue and Vivre.com.