Holidays year round garner their own particular aesthetic, with the commercially crass hearts of Valentine, to the eye-sore bunny ears of Easter, and the attempted expressions of “interpretation” at Halloween. Yet the calendar year culminates in perhaps the tackiest holiday of all, and should you subscribe to any of the below, you should blush with shame as red as Rudolph’s nose. If not, then join me and bask in the icy towers of Grinchendom.

Paper Hats:
These hats have about as much structural integrity as your dignity. Ill-coloured and easily torn, these inventions are a statement of your temporal flimsiness – either commit to the bolder permanence of a Santa hat (God forbid, see below) or wear nothing at all. Moreover, I can’t help but cringe at the rate at which they spread. As soon as one person wears one, a chain reaction plague of paper hats (‘paper’ and ‘hats’ being two words that should never be used in conjunction with one another, I might add) takes the dinner table by storm, rendering your family scene with an aesthetic that resembles a poorly made Hallmarks card. The only thing these hats should be crowning is the bottom of a rubbish bin when torn in two.

Christmas Cracker “Jewellery”:
Sharing the same womb of cheap commercialism of Christmas crackers as paper hats, the so-called “jewellery” yielded is also sentenced to the bottom of the bin. Whether it be a supposed diamond ring (pause here for a scoff) or a hair-clip, it is frankly laughable that their production was ever commissioned in the first place.

Christmas Jumpers:
Ron Weasley, I’m sure, would take one of his mother’s christmas jumpers over the current disease of today’s christmas jumpers faster than he could say ‘Hermione.’ The plethora of jumpers nowadays, with their flashing lights, garish use of red, absolute abuse of the colour burgundy, and use of text, usually a variant of the word ‘festive’, is, as are all clothes which bear writing on them, unforgivable. As such, one should take joy in Made in Chelsea’s Mark-Francis’ damning charge against Christmas jumpers: “I put you in the same category as a battery chicken.”

Santa Hats:
To wear a Santa hat is to generally fall into two categories: you’re a drunk at a Boxing Day pub quiz, or you’re a middle-aged parent attempting to compensate for the lie you told us as children. My willingness to excuse Santa hats extends only to Santa Claus himself, and as he is confined to the realm of fiction and non-existence (take the validity of my exemption of him how you will).

Tinsel “scarves”:
As scratchy and itchy as the personality of those that wear them, refashioning pieces of tinsel to resemble a scarf is festive appropriation taken too far. At least it conceals your Christmas jumper beneath though - there is a silver-tinselled lining.

Onesies:
Return it to the rack in Primark from whence it came. They are not cute. They do not qualify as a costume. Nor do they qualify as pyjamas. Their function and existence in this world is as confused and misguided as your decision to purchase one. Onesies are one thing: the ultimate sign of tackiness.

Stockings:
Should stockings actually fit anyone out there, then might I suggest you put down the minced pie(s) you’re currently holding. And to Big Foot, may you have a warm and comfortable-footed Christmas.