Based on a video by Northlawn Flower Farm and Gardens
Opens their YouTube channel
Steps written out by Crafting Step by Step · Published
A dried flower wreath keeps the garden going through winter. The grower behind Northlawn Flower Farm makes hers in January from flowers she grew and dried the summer before: white pine, larkspur, love-in-a-mist pods, purple gomphrena and strawflowers, wired onto an 18 inch grapevine wreath in a lopsided crescent. Instead of a bow, she adds a house number plate from her grandmother's home.
The whole method is mini bouquets and one long piece of wire. You do not cut the wire until the end.
Choose flowers that hold their colour and shape when dry. Growers call these everlastings.
No dried flowers this year? Walk the garden in late autumn. Seed pods, grasses and hips dry well on the plant, and a craft store bunch or two fills the gaps.
Cut flowers in the morning once the dew is gone, before they open fully. Strip the lower leaves, bind small bunches with a rubber band and hang them upside down in a dark, dry, airy room. Most take two to three weeks. Darkness keeps the colours from fading.
Covering the whole ring takes about twice as many bundles. A crescent, like the one here, uses fewer flowers, shows off the grapevine and leaves room for a sign, bow or number plate. Decide before you start, so you know where to stop wiring.
Dried flowers fade in direct sun and go limp in damp air. A front door under a porch roof, an indoor door, a mantel or a wall all work. Avoid a door that takes rain or full afternoon sun. Mist with a little hairspray to cut down on shedding.
Kept out of sun and damp, a dried wreath looks good for a year or more. Colours soften slowly, which many people like. Dust it now and then with a hair dryer on the cool setting held well back. When a few flowers fade or crumble, glue fresh ones over them. Store it in a box with tissue between seasons, lying flat so the bundles do not crush.
Children can sort flowers by colour and build the mini bouquets while an adult does the wiring and glue gun. It is a good rainy autumn afternoon project, and the wreath becomes a gift for a parent's door.
Swap the floral wire for raffia and skip the glue. When the wreath is past its best, the whole thing can go in the compost pile.
Building a wreath for another season? See how to make a wreath, the fall wreath, or a pinecone wreath, and finish one with a bow for a wreath. For drying, read how to dry flowers.
8 steps, about 8 minutes. Tap a picture to jump to that step. Your progress saves automatically.
Tick each step off as you go.
Gather your dried flowers and greenery and make a pile of small bundles, each about the length of your hand. Layer white pine at the back, then larkspur, gomphrena and a couple of love-in-a-mist pods in front. Lay them out in rows beside an 18 inch grapevine wreath, floral wire and snips. Use whatever you have; there is no wrong mix.
Make all the bundles first. Wiring goes much faster when they are ready.
Turn the grapevine wreath over. Wrap the end of a spool of 24 gauge floral wire around a few vines and twist it around itself several times so it is secure. Tuck the cut end back into the grapevine so it cannot scratch. Turn the wreath face up again. From here on, the wire stays attached to the spool until you finish.
Paddle wire on a flat spool is easier to pass around the wreath than a coil.
Lay the first bundle on the wreath, angled to the right. Wrap the wire around its stems and the vines underneath at least three times. Pull the wire very tight after each wrap. Loose wire lets bundles slip and flop once the wreath hangs. More than three wraps is fine; fewer is not.
Wrap over the stems only, below the flower heads, so the wire stays hidden.
Lay the next bundle angled to the left, overlapping the stems of the first so they are hidden. Wrap it three times and pull snug. Keep going: right, left, right, left. That really is all there is to it. The alternating angles make the wreath look full on both edges, not only along the top.
Step back now and then to check the shape from across the room.
Get down close to the wreath and check each wrap. The wire should bite into the stems and hold the bundle flat against the vines. If a bundle wiggles, add another wrap before moving on. Dried stems are brittle, so pull firmly but steadily rather than yanking, or the stems snap.
If a stem snaps, tuck it in later with a dab of hot glue.
Keep adding bundles around the wreath. For an asymmetrical crescent, like this one, stop about halfway around and leave the rest of the grapevine bare. For a full wreath, keep going until the last bundle tucks under the first. Then cut the wire with a long tail, wrap it around a vine on the back and twist it off.
A full ring takes about twice as many bundles as a crescent.
Cut a long piece of wire and use it to fasten a decoration to the bare side. In the video it is a vintage house number plate from the maker's grandmother's home. Wind the wire around the wreath several times and twist it tight at the back. A ribbon bow, a small sign or a seasonal pick works the same way.
Heavy decorations need two wire points so they do not tip forward.
Finish with a hot glue gun. Glue strawflowers into the bundles, more toward the base and fewer toward the top, so it looks like they are blooming upward. Add a dab of glue to the flower base and press it between the stems. Fill any gaps the same way, then hang your wreath out of direct sun.
Glue only the flower base. Glue strings on dry petals are hard to hide.
Keep going
How to Cut Plates for Mosaic
How to Make a Dried Flower Wreath
E6000
E6000 Craft Adhesive, Clear (3.7 oz)
The industrial-strength craft glue that bonds glass, wood, ceramic, metal, fabric, and concrete. The one adhesive most craft projects reach for.
OLFA
OLFA 18" x 24" Self-Healing Cutting Mat
The pro-standard cutting surface. Gridlines for square cuts, self-healing so blades never leave grooves, and big enough for paper, fabric, and leather.
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