Red and Green are considered the colours of Christmas but how is this so? Certain Christmas traditions such as a green Christmas trees, mistletoe, green-clothed elves, Santa’s red coat and Rudolph's red nose, might seem like the most reasonable explanation. However, this is not the exact answer. There is a combination of explanations with no definitive answer.

Green leaves and red berries of the mistletoe plant played a role in winter solstice celebrations that were observed by Pagans before the popularisation of Christmas. Despite this deep-rooted history and the colours of green and red being linked to winter solstice celebrations, it took hundreds of years, cultural forces and marketing to link Christmas with red and green.

The Victorian Era has been linked with red and green and their association with Christmas. However, Christmas cards at the time featured a variety of different colours such as blue and white. Christmas cards did display the colours of red and green however they were not the most popular nor did the colours dominate the range of Christmas cards.

#SeriouslyFunFact
Did you know that there were no real representations of Santa Claus until the 1930s? This was seen in the Coca-Cola advertisement which included a painting of Santa Claus as a white haired, old man with red and white coat and boots. This was the first collective image of Santa and has been used ever since.