come on people, post! I have a new mantel and I need some ideas for decorating

I tend to put photos and other personal items (a wooden artist's figure, a pretty glass bowl, a mirror, etc) on mine, but I try to leave a clean space margin around each so it doesnt feel so cluttered.

I like to have a few things up there but nothing cluttered. I usually rotate items every month or so so it's always fresh. This is a great place to decorate for the season.

Oh gaaahh... my mother's mantel is so cluttered. I like it spare!

not so many items, only an effective few. but that's because there's no way i could maintain dusting on a cluttered mantel.

right know we are in the process of selling our house so the mantel is bare, but before we had our wedding photo and a set of candle stick holders, they are nice and chunky ands each. weight a good 5 l

I change mine with the season. Right now it has two similar topiaries on either side, two matching lenox votives, and a lenox clock in the middle. It's spaced out evenly, so it does not appear cluttered.

Do NOT have a cluttered mantel. Bad feng shui for starters. Put tall items on it, which draws your attention and forces the eye upwards for a more dramatic statement. Leave the middle of the mantel bare and deal with the ends or do the middle and leave the ends bare. Take all personal photos off a mantel; they do not belong there.

I would keep it simple like the setting from the pic above. Don't add candles on the mantle or otherwise you would end up with smoke stains on the wall when you light up. Believe me trying to clean smoke stains is a pain in the azz.

I have mine decorated with a decorative box and ornate obelisk type thing (LOL) on one side, a vase with willow branches on the other and a Bev Doolittle print hanging low in the middle. I'm still looking for something for the middle of the mantle that is low enough to fit under the print. So, yes decorated but not cluttered.

oh and yes, I like to decorate it differently for Fall and Christmas.

Mine's loaded with baseball memorabilia...a minor league bat, a couple of MLB baseballs, some minors baseballs, etc.

It could probably stand to be less cluttered but...I've got four kids and two of them are baseball fans. *shrug*

My grandma's mantel (Like most grandmas) is packed with candid pictures of everyone in the family. It's so much fun to look at all the pictures in their mixed-matched frames. It gives her sitting room a very home-like feel. So sometimes clutter isn't bad.

i think that i would limit my mantel (if i had one) to just a couple candles or maybe a photo - and that's about it. my mom has a lot of stuff on hers and to me it does look to be a bit cluttered.

clean, except at christmas when it is draped with garland and candles and red ornaments. getting in the mood just thinking about it

Mine is fairly cluttered. It houses travel objects I have collected. A morrocan mirror, a larger picture of Venice, an african style paper-mache tiger (which looks like one of my kitties), an asian-style dragon lantern, an apothecary jar with random orbs (just to tie together the colors), two old original-binding books stair-stepped, and 3 pillar candles. They are all in the same color-families, and the rest of the room is fairly bare, so it works. Things get rotated a lot, too. Changing your mantel is great for those of us with decorating ADD.

I like them cluttered, as long as they appear to have a ddecorated look. I have a friend who has one that is cluttered and it looks horrible b/c there is no unifying style to it. (But then she says mine has "a lot of stuff on it." I sometimes question her taste, anyway..)

i like them bare
maybe a plant or candle and that's it

Put tall items on it, which draws your attention and forces the eye upwards for a more dramatic statement.

Owner- beat drug test