DECORATING : Bells Ring in the Season as More Than Holiday Music

Bells are a natural for the holidays.

“They put people in a good mood,” says Terry Mayer of New York.

Mayer, who calls herself a “bellologist,” owns about 200 bells, a small collection, she says, considering she’s a member of the American Bell Assn. and president of the New York metropolitan chapter for the past seven years.

Bell collectors, she says, often use bells as holiday decor, particularly on trees. The most impressive tree may be the one with 800 bell ornaments on view at the Smithsonian National Museum of American Art in Washington during the 1985 holiday season.

Members of the American Bell Assn. donated the bells and decorated the tree. The bells are now part of the museum’s collections.

For holiday dining, tie a belled ribbon around a stemmed glass or use bells to make napkin rings. Continue the bell motif on the menu, with bell molds for cakes, cookies, gelatin desserts or salads.

Some collectors go so far as to tie small bells to lengths of ribbon and twine them around bed posts, chandelier arms or banisters. One collector turned her front door into a “gift box” by gluing a wide ribbon on the vertical and horizontal dimensions and placing a spray of bells where the ribbons meet.

Bells come in a range of materials (including metal, wood, ceramic and glass), sizes (from no bigger than a fingernail) and shapes.

The open bell with a suspended clapper, such as the Liberty Bell, is probably the most familiar. Chime bells, another type, sound only when struck with a stick or gong or by another bell. The so-called crotal, or jingle bell, is a globe with a pellet or jinglet inside that makes a noise when the crotal is shaken. The crotal is believed to be the oldest type. Crotals dating to the 8th or 9th Century BC have been found in present-day Iran.

Mayer’s affinity for bells began in 1978 when, as a New York fashion publicist, she sewed bells onto a denim neckband and wore the band as part of a “let’s ring the bells for denim” promotion. People wanted to buy the bells.

Mayer signed up for a jewelry-making course at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology. She soon was out of PR and into bell jewelry. She sells more than 125 styles via mail order and jewelry stores and lectures on bells.

Her New York City apartment is a-jingle in bells. They’re on shelves, in shadow boxes, on all the tables. Images of bells hang on the walls. She gives bell-trimmed pillows as wedding gifts.

Some people find bells so appealing they call in their decorator. Mayer recalls one bedroom decorated by designer Mario Buatta in which window valances were edged with tiny bells. She says another interior designer hung bells in a row over a queen-size bed. The carved bells were solid wood, so they made no sound, but they added a touch of whimsy.