When Elsa Schiaparelli said that “in difficult times, forge is always outrageous”, she probably wasn’t talking about Christmas trees. But this week – as Britain’s most chi chi inform ons and hotels unveiled their festive decors – an unorthodox aesthetic has appeared that proves her point.

Following a manner of recent years, many of the Christmas trees in top hotels make been created by world-famous designers and artists. At London’s Connaught, for norm, Tracey Emin’s tree eschewed traditional baubles and tinsel and was live ined with handwritten neon words that made up a tally poem. Elsewhere in Mayfair, little forests of Christmas trees had emerged up in the windows of designer shops, dramatically lit and sparsely decorated.

The upside-down Christmas tree in the revered reception of Claridge’s hotel is similarly spooky. Designed by Karl Lagerfeld, it is a huge inverted V, with silvered roots fanning out, like something from the Nightmare Ahead of Christmas. This upside-down aesthetic is not just a conceptual communiqu. It has also become an unlikely real-life festive trend, with chaotic trees being sold on Amazon.

Uniform with more avant garde is Matty Bovan’s neon pink tree, at the Ace breakfast’s Hoi Polloi brasserie in east London. Bovan – a young originator shortlisted for an emerging talent gong at the Fashion awards on Monday – has produced a pink Lurex vision, dotted with mini-sculptures. He ring ups this a “modern folk tale full of disturbing, splendid and sculptural pieces” and adds: “The objects on my tree reflect both the tremblings and joys of 2017, and there is an overall positive feeling of desire radiating through the whole tree looking towards to 2018, go away through the only way we really can, which is to keep being resourceful.”