December is here, and that means that a lot of people around the world have started putting up their Christmas decorations. While it's traditional to wait until 8 December in some countries, many people today start to decorate as soon the month begins (or as soon as Halloween is over if you're a high-street retailer).
And with the decorations come the inevitable Christmas decoration design fails, of which we've seen many. Reddit has been a veritable depository of Christmas design fails over the years, from illegible window stickers to questionable angel candles and... er, 'fuckering lights'. Below we round up some of our favourites from the past ten years, along with the festive lessons we can learn from them.
Looking for some seasonal inspiration? See our pick of the best free Christmas fonts and the best Christmas adverts of all time.
01. Bell-shaped bells
I'm gonna put them on my Christmas tree shaped Christmas tree. from r/funny
Starting off our list of Christmas decoration design fails, a wonderful piece of tautology from the product department. Looking for a present to stuff in someone's stocking shaped stocking? Then look no further. There is a possible explanation for this one, maybe. I presume the brand perhaps also makes bells in other shapes. All the same, this made me chuckle. Every time a bell-shaped bell rings and angel-shaped angel gets its wing-shaped wings, one person jests on Reddit.
02. Fuckering lights
Fuckering Lights from r/CrappyDesign
The terrible kerning in this Christmas decoration design fail was so good it made it to our pick of the worst design fails of all time. The lesson here should be pretty obvious. There's more to getting type right in packaging design than just choosing the font. A little kerning to add space between the 'L' and the 'I' would have been a good idea here.
3. I believe in...?
Not sure if christmas or murder scene.... from r/CrappyDesign
A festive mug design here... I think. Or maybe it's left over from Halloween. Despite the X-Files having appropriated the 'I believe' line, we presume this is supposed to refer to Santa, who appears to have been slaughtered in a terrible bloodbath. Perhaps it's merchandise for CSI Lapland. There's a lesson to be learned here. Christmas isn't the only thing associated with the colour red.
4. Almost any novelty Christmas candle
My grandmas new candle holders from r/CrappyDesign
Novelty candle designs are notorious for causing unintended hilarity due to their tendency to form suggestive shapes, and Christmas-themed designs tend to be even more risque. It seems impossible the designer didn't realise how this looked (or that everybody else was too polite to tell them).
5. CMERRYS HRISTMA
CMEЯRYS HRISTMA, I guess? from r/CrappyDesign
Holidays like Christmas tend to bring out everyone's inner love of wild experimental type. But making the message on your window sticker illegible isn't clever; it's just perplexing. The aim here seemed to be to create some kind of symmetry with the huge 'C' and 'S' at either end and the mirrored 'R' in the middle... No, I'm just trying to be generous; I don't know what they were thinking.
6. Demon reindeer
Light up Christmas banner that my family got. I think you can see why we decided to keep it unlit. from r/CrappyDesign
Christmas means lights. Lots of them, anywhere you can out them. But I think this Redditer was very sensible in deciding to leave this banner turned off. The demon reindeer is enough to cause many a nightmare before Christmas.
Looking for stocking fillers? How about the KFC Christmas fragrance? No? Well, we also have a festive gift guide for creatives that could help provide some inspiration.
