For reference, our current 9-foot Christmas tree fits nicely in our new sunroom, but it takes up enough floor space that we had to move a couple of pieces of furniture for the season just to make room. How much more floor space does a 12-foot tree take compared to a 9-foot tree?
Let's see, if the trees are of similar ratios in terms of height to base, then the height of the 12-foot tree is 4/3 that of the 9-foot tree, so the radius of the base is 4/3 of the smaller tree. The floor space can be computed by pi*r^2, so the 12-foot tree is pi*4/3*4/3 = 16/9*pi, and the 9-foot tree is just pi. So the larger tree is 16/9 that of the smaller tree, and takes about 77.8% more floor space.
When we started constructing this sequoia, we soon realized that it was consuming the entire living room. Fortunately, I tapped my engineering skills, and decided to remove the back half of the tree that would be in the corner. This created an unbalanced, 400-lb. leaning tower of spruce, a real danger to everyone in the house. So I constructed a system of ropes and weights to keep the thing upright.
I placed the bow on top of the tree from the second-floor balcony, and it took Caroline 5 days to decorate it. There was a lot of money sunk into this tree as well... the tree itself probably retails for about $900 today. Luckily, Caroline got a good deal on it at Bed, Bath, and Beyond. I don't want to think about how much we spent on lights, ornaments, etc.
Caroline's parents spent the holiday with us, so at least someone else got to see this Mall-sized tree in our house. We were fortunate enough to find some sucker (one of Caroline's co-workers) who thought "Hey, what I need is a 12-foot Christmas tree!" to take it off of our hands.
The most amazing thing is that I failed to record this monstrosity in a photo. I guess I thought we'd put it up year after year. Here's a close approximation of the tree.
