Making your own Christmas wreath is a great craft project to help celebrate the festive season. This tutorial is for a christmas wreath made from ribbon poinsettias. These ribbon poinsettias are easy to make and look beautiful when made from glossy satin ribbon. Here’s what you will need –
- satin ribbon – 5cm wide
- floristry wire
- scissors
- a wreath base – of whatever material you like
- a hot glue gun
- embellishments – bells, bead (optional)
For each ribbon poinsettia you will need to cut three strips of ribbon approximately 15cm long.
Cut the ends of the ribbon to form points – you will need to do this for both ends.
Fold each strip of ribbon like a concertina: fold in half and then fold the outer edges in opposite directions. Your ribbon should look like a bow tie (see the image above)
As you fold each strip thread them onto a pin to hold them in place until you are ready to secure them with wire.
Take a piece of wire, also 15cm long and fold over so it resembles a hair pin.
Put the wire over the centre of the three strips of ribbon and twist a couple of times at the back to make it secure. You can now remove the pin.
Cross over your wires – this is the hardest part. If you look at the image above you can see the wire is attached in three different directions: one straight across (the first step of attaching the wire) and two in diagonally opposite directions. To make your first diagonal, take one of the ends of the wire from the back, separate your ‘petals’ and take the wire up through one pair of divided petals and down through the opposite pair of divided petals. Take the second end of the wire from the back and repeat the same steps on the opposite side. With both wire ends now at the back, give them a final couple of twists to make your flower secure. You can now play with your petals until you have achieved a look that you are happy with.
If you want to add beads or bells to the centre of your ribbon flower, simply add the embellishment at the wiring step.
The rest of the ribbon is completed in the same way as the plain ribbon flowers.
I made a lot of ribbon flowers in a short amount of time – enough for two wreaths. It is up to you how you choose to attach your ribbon poinsettias to make a wreath. I added my ribbon flowers to a gold wire hoop using my hot gue gun. A similar method could be used regardless of what you choose for your wreath base.
Here are my two Christmas wreaths hanging in our rumpus room.
And there’s no reason you can’t make these in other colours and use them as gift toppers or hair bows. Join me on Instagram for other Christmas craft activities.