JONATHAN ADLER: A Merry Chrismukkah

A household name for his Mod decorative ceramics and textiles, Jonathan Adler becomes a minimalist this time each year. “I had a pretty classic Jewish upbringing: Go to the movies and have Chinese food on Christmas Day, while Hanukkah was an eight-day extravaganza where we were so fixated on the gifts that decorating didn’t matter,” he says.

Now, he is making up for lost time. “I am a convert to Chrismukkah. I’m Jewish, my boyfriend is gentile and our dog, Liberace, is a pagan,” says the designer, author of the new coffee-table book “My Prescription for Anti-Depressive Living.”

Living on the ninth floor of a prewar apartment building in New York’s Greenwich Village, Adler preaches a “deconstructed holiday design scheme, where you don’t have to put in too much effort, worry about flammability, kill a tree and deal with the gnarly cleanup in January,” he says. “In New York, we don’t have the luxury of being able to pull an SUV up to the door.”

Most years, Adler places Christmas bulbs bearing the likeness of Liberace — the pianist, not the dog — on the mantel. “Liberace induces instant holiday cheer. He’s a nondenominational icon in our multidenominational home,” Adler chirps antidepressively.

This year, Adler’s tree is a 1960s white metal accessories retail fixture, hung with his miniature menagerie of ceramic figurines. They are available at his Melrose Avenue store or through www.jonathanadler.com.

The streamlined sapling sits next to one of his menorahs and a Danish figural vase by Björn Winblad on a mirror-topped white-lacquered Danish Modern credenza in his vivid green dining room. On the wall, completing the picture, is a nude by Pop artist Mel Ramos.

“It’s always good to be a bit racy at the holidays,” Adler says. “I do think the holidays are a time when people reflect on their life, and they may get a bit glum. That’s why a chartreuse room is an absolute necessity at this time. It’s a surefire way to banish the holiday blues.”