The snow is falling, the fires are crackling, and the holiday season is officially here. If you’re ready to turn your Gather office into a winter wonderland, we’ve got a variety of ways you can customize your space and engage your team.
For the purposes of this guide, we’re going to focus on decorating your existing Gather space. If you’d like to create a new winter-themed space or add a dedicated winter-themed room, you can browse our templates here.
- Place snow-covered trees.
- Build a snowman.
- Give gifts to your team.
- Dress your avatar in the winter spirit.
- Create a Gratitude Board.
- Decorate a giant tree together.
- Host a holiday party.
Note: For some of these tips, you’ll need to have Read more about user permissions here.
1. Place snow-covered trees.
Spruce up the evergreens in your office with fresh snow, guaranteed not to melt until spring! (Or at least until someone starts landscaping in Mapmaker.)
If you open up the Object Picker, you’ll see a variety of trees with a snow-covered option. Select the tree type you want to place and look for the white color-variation. This means it’s covered in snow!
2. Build a snowman
Or place a wide variety of wintery decorations in your space. You’ll find a giant gingerbread house, Christmas tree, snowmobile – all the essentials, really.
To place these decorations in your space, open up the Build Tool or use the Mapmaker. If you want to really delight your team, add these festive decorations at a time when most people are offline. Then the next time they come into the virtual office, they’ll be surprised with a winter wonderland!
3. Give gifts to your team
Spread some holiday cheer by placing a present on your teammates’ desks! You can type a note in the object to share words of gratitude, or embed a website URL.
A few ideas of URLs to embed:
- A link to a holiday playlist
- A link to a holiday video from your leadership team
- A link to a digital gift card
You can also embed videos or embed images into objects on Gather.
4. Dress your avatar in the winter spirit
Not only can you build a snowman, but you can become one. Once your space is decorated for the season, encourage your team to express themselves this winter with seasonal wearables.
You’ll find the full-body transformations (the snowman and gingerbread person) in the Special tab of the Character Customization window. Wintery hats and earmuffs can be found in Accessories.
5. Create a Gratitude Board
The holidays are a special time to reflect as a team, and you can use objects in Gather to create a place in your office dedicated to reflecting and celebrating.
By embedding a URL in an object, you can make it interactive and give employees a way to give each other shoutouts. For example, you could link a shared Google Doc, Google Slide, or a Miro board that your team has access to.
If you aren’t using one of these tools yet, you can use one of our Whiteboard objects, which are powered by Eraser and automatically give your whole team a place to collaborate and type/draw notes.
6. Decorate a giant tree together
Nothing brings people together like decorating a giant tree, and it’ll certainly liven up your office for the rest of the season!
This team activity is really easy to organize, also. All you need to do is add the tree, invite your team, and then place objects on top of it. You can decorate it traditionally with ornaments or stars, or use any object in Gather (or upload your own) to really make it feel like your own.
This help doc includes a PNG for the giant tree you see in that image, along with a few other tips for hosting a tree decorating party.
7. Host a holiday party
Now that your office is decked out for the season, don’t forget to host a holiday party for your team! Block off time on the calendar for everyone to take a break from work and share experiences together.
Looking for activities to do? Try these:
- If you haven’t already decorated your office tree, do that to kick off the event.
- Gather ‘round the Gratitude Board and take turns reading the notes everyone has left.
- Sit around a winter bonfire and share stories.
- Play some of the embedded board games from the Object Picker.
For more details about hosting a holiday party on Gather and inviting guests or first-time Gather members, read our full guide here.
