The Raxa Collective Holiday tree at Cardamom County, 2012.

Two years ago, the Raxa Collective team designed a new kind of conical decoration to replace the traditional pine tree at Cardamom County, one of Raxa Collective’s properties in Kerala, India. Pictured left, this tree received many compliments from employees and guests alike, was considered a success all around, and came out again last year with some new ornaments at Cardamom County. For the last several years, Xandari has relied on a small palm tree from the gardens here as the holiday ornament, but the resort has been looking for alternatives. When I showed the team what might now be considered the “Raxa Collective tree,” they were immediately excited and started planning to build one straight away.

And so it was that Edwin (José Luis‘s brother) and I found ourselves in two of the several bamboo groves on Xandari property with a saw and a machete on Tuesday. We started out with a simple sketch design of our planned tree based on the images we’d seen of the Indian version, then set out to cut a couple bamboo poles for the construction phase. We knew we’d need three 2.1 meter poles for the pyramid sides, so we got them from one type of medium-thickness bamboo. Then we needed twenty-one rods of seven different lengths (see design photo above), so we went to a grove of thinner type of bamboo. 

Once we cut the seven triplets of rods of decreasing length (e.g. three 1-meter rods, three .92m rods, three .81 rods, and so on), Edwin trimmed the branches off and I washed the natural dirt or plant growth off the rods. Then we drilled 1.5-inch screws into the connection between one of the meter rods and the feet of two of the 2.1m pyramid sides, and used wire to tie the tops of the long poles together, so we ended up with a triangle. We added the other two meter rods and the third pyramid side to get the full pyramid, and then, with the help of José Luis, added all the “rungs” from the bottom to the top to get what is pictured right.

Next, I cut 1-meter lengths of a thick twine that we’d purchased for this purpose, and tied them in an invented but consistent pattern on every joint between the poles. This twine both covers all the screws and gives the structure significantly more structural integrity, in addition to lending it a more rustic look.

A view from below and within

Finally, I added the Chinese paper lanterns to the interior of the structure. The team at Xandari wanted to try more colors than the simple yet elegant white that was used at Cardamom County, so we chose the traditional mistletoe scheme of red and green to complement the white lanterns.

The next step is to choose lighting for the interior of the tree, probably some sort of LED-bulb string that winds through the lanterns. We might also add extra “rungs” of twine between the bamboo ones to both support the lanterns more and give the tree a more closed sort of look. Then we need to move this thing up to the lobby area and give it some sort of star to top it off! I’ll share better quality photos once that happens. Happy holidays!