Long before plastic villages and plug-in towns, families set out little glittered cardboard houses under the Christmas tree. They were called putz houses, and they have come back in a big way, partly because they look wonderful, and partly because they fit on a mantel in a way a full village never will. Nobody makes them with more personality than Cody Foster. Pink manors, a poodle palace, a bookstore, a dispensary. Alongside the classic snowy cottages, they are what a putz village looks like when someone with a sense of humour builds it. How do you build a Cody Foster village that looks like a street rather than a shelf? This is how the collection breaks down, and how to build a display that looks like a street rather than a shelf. Shop putz houses → โฆ THE SHORT ANSWER Cody Foster Christmas houses are decorative village pieces in the vintage putz style: glittered cardboard manors, shops and cottages with snowy roofs and bottle brush trees, plus a separate line of brass tea light houses and townhouses. The glittered houses run from about sixty to a hundred and forty-five dollars, and some of the larger ones, such as the Snowman Manor, can be lit from inside with a C7 light cord sold separately. Build in three depths (manors at the back on risers, shops in the middle, cottages in front) and keep cardboard pieces away from damp, in storage and on display. What a Putz House Is A putz house is a small decorative house made from cardboard or paper, finished with glitter, and set out as part of a Christmas village. The tradition came to America with German immigrants, and the name comes from the German word for decorating. Our post All About Putz Houses covers the history in full. What matters for buying is the material. Cardboard and glitter give these houses their soft, sparkling, slightly handmade look, and they are also why they need different care from a porcelain village. What Makes Cody Foster Different The traditional putz recipe is all there: cardboard construction, a heavy coat of glitter, snowy roofs, tiny bottle brush trees by the door. What Cody Foster adds is colour and wit. The palette runs to pink, mint, lilac and blue as often as white, and the buildings themselves are as likely to be a bookstore or an ice cream parlour as a cottage. Every piece is hand-finished, so no two are identical. That is part of the appeal and part of the reason they sell through. The Manors The manors are the centrepiece of any Cody Foster village. Buy one first and build around it. Cody Foster Snowman Manor: sixteen inches of glittery green and pink, with garland, bows, a frosty wreath and a snowman at the door; lights from inside with a C7 cord Cody Foster Merry Manor: the same scale, for a pair of grand houses at the back of a display Cody Foster Merry Reindeer Chateau: a chateau for the reindeer, and the one children point at Cody Foster Candy Cane Manor House: red-and-white candy stripes; the most traditional of the manors Cody Foster No Place Like Home for the Holiday House: a family house for the holidays, and one of the warmest pieces in the range Cody Foster Enchanted Winter Villa: pink and blue with snow accents, 11.5 inches; one of our best-selling houses last year Cody Foster Pink Chateau Townhouse: fifteen inches tall and narrow, so it adds height without taking much depth Shops and Storefronts Every village needs a main street. Shops are where the Cody Foster humour shows most, and a row of three makes a display instantly read as a town. Cody Foster The Tattered Cover Bookstore: a favourite with readers, and a perfect gift for one Cody Foster Ice Cream Shoppe: a sweet shopfront in candy colours Cody Foster Sugar & Spice Bake House: the bakery, and the natural neighbour for the ice cream shop Cody Foster Antique Shop: 14.5 inches tall; one of our most popular houses in 2025 Cody Foster Dispensary House: for those who like their village with a wink Related Products Cottages and Small Houses Small houses fill the gaps and do more than anything else to make a display look like a real street. Buy more of these than you think you need. Cody Foster Santa Cottage White: eleven inches, white and snowy; the classic putz cottage Cody Foster Purple Palm Springs House: a mid-century desert house in purple Cody Foster Petite Mint House: small, soft and the most affordable house in the collection Cody Foster Poodle Palace: 12.5 inches of pink glitter, built for toy poodles Cody Foster Candy Cane Cottage: fourteen inches, and a natural partner for the Candy Cane Manor Cody Foster Blue Townhouse: a narrow townhouse that fits where nothing else will The Brass Houses Cody Foster also makes a line of brass houses that sits apart from the glittered village. They are cleaner and more architectural, and they look right all winter rather than only in December. Cody Foster Brass Star Tea Light House: ten inches, with a cut-out star pattern that throws shadows across a room Cody Foster Brass Snowflake Tea Light House: the same idea with a snowflake design Cody Foster Brass Victorian Townhouse: a brass Victorian townhouse Cody Foster Brass Suburban Townhouse: the brass suburban townhouse Cody Foster Brass Chimney House: a smaller brass house to finish a row The brass houses and the glittered houses can share a display, but they look best on separate surfaces: brass on a side table or windowsill, glitter on the mantel. How to Build a Cody Foster Village Start with the surface. A mantel, a sideboard or a deep shelf all work. Lay down a snow blanket or white felt and slide books or boxes underneath it to create two or three levels before a single house goes down. Build in three depths. Manors at the back on the highest level, shops in the middle, cottages and small houses in front. Angle each house a few degrees off square to the front edge; it is the cheapest trick in display work and it removes the shop-shelf look immediately. Add trees for depth. Bottle brush trees between the houses, and Cody Foster glass trees behind them, make a shallow display look twice as deep. Our village accessories are brand-agnostic and work just as well with putz houses. Cluster, do not space. Real streets cluster. Push two houses close together and leave a genuine gap elsewhere. Put a shop next to a cottage rather than lining up all the shops, so the street looks like it grew over time rather than arriving in one delivery. “Real streets cluster.” OUR DISPLAY ADVICE Lighting Some of the larger houses, like the Snowman Manor, have a hole in the back for a C7 light cord, sold separately. Check each product page, because not every house is designed to be lit, and the smaller cottages usually are not. For the rest, a strand of warm white string lights woven through the snow blanket lights the street rather than the houses, which is often the better effect. Keep any bulb from resting directly against cardboard. Mixing With Other Villages Customers often ask whether Cody Foster houses can sit alongside a Department 56 or Lemax village. They can share a room, but they rarely look their best sharing a table. The reason is style rather than size. A porcelain or resin village is built for realism: painted brick, tiny lit windows, figures in proportion to the doors. A putz house is softer, sparkly and deliberately a little storybook. Put the two side by side and each makes the other look slightly wrong. The better approach is two displays. Keep your Christmas village on the sideboard or under the tree, and give the Cody Foster houses the mantel, where the glitter catches the firelight. If you only have one surface, separate them with a stand of bottle brush trees or a run of glass trees so each group reads as its own scene. Common Mistakes Buying only manors. Three large houses in a row is a skyline with no street. Equal spacing. Cluster the houses and leave gaps. Everything square to the front edge. Angle them slightly. Displaying in a window that collects condensation. Cardboard and glitter do not like damp. Storing Cardboard Houses This is where putz houses differ most from porcelain. Moisture is the enemy: it softens cardboard, lifts glitter and warps roofs. Wrap each house in acid-free tissue, keep the original boxes, and store them in an interior cupboard rather than a damp basement or a hot attic. Never clean them with a damp cloth. A soft, dry brush removes dust without lifting the glitter. When to Buy The houses sell through earlier than the ornaments, because there are fewer of them and they are bought as centrepieces. Several of our best-selling Cody Foster houses were gone by mid-December last year, and once a design sells out we often cannot reorder during the season. Buy the manor you want first. The cottages will still be there in November. Shop putz houses → Visit our stores to see the houses lit → Oct 19th 2026 SHARE THIS GUIDE
