DIY With Flowers: Floral Bracelet
We’ve now shown you how to make a floral sponge in a box decoration and a beautiful wedding basket, so how about something to make you look great? In our latest update of DIY With Flowers, we’ll show you how to make your own floral bracelet! It’s perfect for a spring or summer party and will make you stand out from the crowd.
What do you need?
As always, you are free to choose whatever flowers you think you would like on your bracelet. It’s best that you try to avoid having too many flowers which are too big, as it may make it difficult to put your bracelet together and even more difficult to maintain it. Don’t be afraid to experiment. Here are the flowers that we have used and would recommend:
- Bouvardia
- Purple limonium
- Lisianthus
- Baby’s breath (also known as gypsophila)
There’s also some basic equipment that you’ll require, including:
- Metal wire
- Shears and wire cutters (scissors will also do the job in both cases, provided your wire isn’t too thick)
- Floral tape
- Satin (or similar material) ribbon
Instructions
Step 1 – Prepare the wire
First job is to measure the wire to cut it the right length. You should measure it to fit across your wrist and leave 2cm extra spare to make sure that it’s comfortable, particularly once all the flowers are added. Then cut off any extra wire that you won’t need (you could always use this to make a second bracelet for a friend or relative).
Be careful not to cut enough wire to fit around your whole wrist, as you won’t need that much, the wire is only going to pass over the top of your wrist, the ribbon will wrap around the rest.
Step 2 – Attach ribbon to the wire
Put the wire in the middle of the ribbon, as shown above, and make sure that there is ribbon either side of the wire in the middle. Then you can attach the ribbon to the wire by gently wrapping around the wire with floral tape. This will keep everything in place and ensure that the flowers are secure once they are added.
Step 3 – Add some flowers
You can finally let your inner florist out! We recommend that you start with some limonium stems. Place them as close as you can to the wire and ribbon and, to start with, at one end so that you can then attach by wrapping the floral tape around the stem and the wire to make them secure.
Step 4 – Keep adding more
When you then add more flowers, bouvardia in this case, you continue the same pattern and method as detailed above. You may need to spread the flowers around or swap ends at some point to avoid the bracelet looking crowded.
It’s best to allow the flowers to slightly overlap each other, because this allows your bracelet to look full, but not overflowing, and will allow you to show off the beauty of all of the different flowers that you are going to use.
Continue wrapping the floral tape around your wrist until all of the flowers are secure, and then cut off the end of the tape.
Step 5 – Tie it on your wrist
Then, you’re ready to tie it onto your wrist. If you’re saving it for a special occasion, it is worth tying it onto your wrist just to make sure that you’ve got enough ribbon and that everything has gone to plan, don’t want any nasty last minute surprises!
Step 6 – Take care of your bracelet
People may easily forget this part, but it’s worth remembering to ensure that your bracelet looks great for as long as possible and so that the flowers maintain their freshness. The most important thing is to not forget that you’re wearing it! One important tip is that while this bracelet is a great look for spring or summer, it’s also suited to special occasions in the winter. The only thing to remember is that it may be worth waiting until you’ve taken your coat off to put it on, or you could end up with some squashed flowers! Like a lot of nature, flowers are delicate, so will easily be damaged if you don’t take care of them.
Don’t forget to check back next week for the last installment in our DIY With Flowers series, where we’ll be showing you how to make sublime table centrepiece arrangements using recycled glass jars or bottles, perfect for any big parties or wedding, and certainly much cheaper than the usual centrepieces on offer!
