ornaments for tree

Wearing colorful caps with flowers on the end, three owls patiently await the holiday season. Peru's Margarita and Martha handcraft the sweet bird ornaments of dried mate gourds. The bird ornaments arrive nestled in a storage box.

These three hand carved gourd ornaments by artisan Teodolinda Seguil of Peru transition beautifully from red to a rich dark brown. Lovely birds and flowers are carved into the base on all sides. Select these ornaments for a hand crafted addition to your holiday tree.

Peruvian artisan Percy Rojas's crafts this set of two dried gourd ornaments designed as tiny bird houses. The artisan grows, harvests and dries the gourds himself using them in wonderful and creative ways. Each ornament is hand painted with floral details in vivid colors to brighten any tree or Christmas decor. They can also be used outdoors and make a great gift for bird watchers.

Stylized peacocks and pretty flowers pose on festive ornaments — one each in green, red, yellow and orange. Working in an ancient art they learned from their father, the Canto Sisters craft the set from dried gourds harvested from the yerba mate plant. They are cleaned, dried and painted before the images are meticulously engraved around the surface by hand.

Cultivated on the Peruvian coast for 6,000 years, mate gourds were decorated with images of birds and fish by the pre-Inca Moche and Chimu peoples. But it was the Inca who went on to use the gourds as cups and bowls, in ceremonial objects and in musical instruments.

Because each unique piece is handcrafted from a natural gourd, please expect slight variations in shape, size and motifs.

For the design of this three-ornament set, Huancayan artisan Daniel Vargas has carved ascending flowering vines against a red background on each dried mate gourd. Mate forms part of the same creeping vine family as pumpkins and melons. The Andean community of Huancayo has a strong mate burilado, or "engraved gourd" legacy, wherein the mate fruit is dried and then engraved with unique designs using a buril, or "burin".