Telegraph readers on the real versus artificial Christmas tree debate

Who does the best trees?

“10 years ago a friend gave me a little real one from M&S” Mary-Grace says. “I used it in church and brought it home after midnight mass.”

Mary-Grace’s husband “used a method of benign neglect and kept it alive for nine more Christmases, growing into a reasonably sized table top tree.”

“Sadly, this summer, it turned up its toes and died. It will be down to M&S again this year I think.”

Susan has always preferred a real tree, but when she had a spinal operation, she “couldn’t lift, handle, light and decorate a real tree. Nor could I manage the drying out and dropping from the branches and twigs.”

After seeing her daughter buy a Balsam Hill tree, she decided to opt for the same: “It was fantastic, even for a die-hard real tree aficionado. Not the real thing but jolly festive without the work.”

Elissa agreed that Balsam Hill trees are “probably the best” but she said she always enjoys surveying the trees at John Lewis, seeing “how realistic they are, the sizes (I wish they did really small ones) and decorating ideas”.

She shared a fond memory of her Christmas tree when she was living in New York City thirty years ago. She had a “one foot silver pre-lit (multi-coloured) tree from Woolworths. It sat in the only window we had in our tiny flat”.