DIY Crepe Paper Anemones
After mixing and adapting a few techniques and ideas + new ones we picked up along the way and lots of trial and error, we made these crepe paper anemones just how we had envisioned: detailed but achievable. The leaves – cardstock folded in half and cut in the shape of a leaf and hand stamped with white ink – can double as escort cards, beautifully hanging from a moss covered frame. Thank you Ashley for helping me with these!
Supplies you’ll need:
floral wire
floral tape
crepe paper/streamers
cotton balls
fringe scissors
scissors and fringe scissors
petal template
For the leaves you’ll need:
cardstock
stamp set (we used this one)
ink
scissors
We’re going to start by preparing an assembly line. Once you have all of your bits and bobs prepped and cut, you can assemble your paper anemones in a snap:
1. Stem — Cut the wire at desired length. For these flowers, the length of the wire was about 4 inches, but you can cut a longer length to make a bouquet or shorter to make bouts!
2. Stamens — Using a piece of cardboard as a template, wrap the streamer in one length a few times. Cut the ends. Repeat the process, this time wrapping the streamer in the other length. Cut both ends. You will then have strips of paper in two different lengths. The shorter pieces will be the button stamens and the longer pieces will be the fringed stamens. With the long pieces, fold them in half and make a fringe using fringe scissors.
3. Petals — Cut sheets of crepe paper into strips at desired width of your flower. In my case, our flower template is about 3 inches, so I eyeballed about 4 inch strips of paper (4″ by 19″ which is the width of the roll). With the help of a paper cutter, I stacked several layers of paper strips and started cut them into squares. This stack of paper will soon be your petals.
I stacked a few square sheets and placed the template on top. Start cutting the sheets along the edge of the template. Once the petals are cut, fold them in half and make a cut with the tips of your scissors at the center. Fold them in half again in the opposite direction (so you have a ‘+’fold) and cut again in the middle. You will use this center cut to thread your petals through the stem.
How to make crepe paper anemones:
1. Using small pieces of cotton, wrap it around the wire, like a q-tip. Add on a short piece of crepe paper streamer on top and twist the ends with your fingers around the wire.
2. With the fringed stamen still folded in half, wrap around the button stamen and twist the bottom part around the wire with your fingers.
3. Gently pull the petals before you thread them. Crepe paper has a bit of a give, so it’s easy to shape the petals. Thread two layers of petals (or more if you prefer) through the stem.
4. Wrap the stem with floral tape and you’re done!
photo above by Samm Blake
Check out our DIY Projects page for more paper flowers!
Awesome tutorial and can’t wait to try it!! I’ve been wanting to learn how to make this type of paper flower for the longest. One quick thing: I think your link for the petal template is missing a forward slash…but once it’s added in, the template came up just fine!
thanks for the heads up! all fixed 🙂
I’ve been trying to figure out how to make crepe paper Anemones for our upcoming wedding but the shape just never came out the way I hoped it would. I can’t wait to give these a try! Thank you!
I am now planning my wedding, and I want to make a special decoration, unfortunately, I am not finding anything 100% satisfying, everything seems boring and usual… My mom suggested we do the decoration and invitation cards at home hand-made, I didn’t like her idea first but after reading this blog I am changing my mind… Thank you
Thank you for your incredible tutorial. Quick question.
Your step 3:
Gently pull the petals before you thread them. Crepe paper has a bit of a give, so it’s easy to shape the petals. Thread two layers of petals (or more if you prefer) through the stem
Question: What do we thread the petals through? Im not clear on this step. Thank you!
I made these! https://pinterest.com/pin/272186371200442790/ Super easy, just takes time and the fringe/herb scissors. My wedding colors are bordeaux and ivory, so I switched out some of the black and the leaves will be light green with names embossed in ivory.
Christine, you make a little cross in the center of the petals and slide them from the end of the wire (without the stamen) up to the stamen.
The real trick is to make the stamen thick enough before the fringe so that it has something to wrap around, I actually folded over about half an inch of the wire before adding the cotton, this gave me a stronger, easier to work with base. I’ve been working on these for about 45 minutes at a time, so it’s taken a long time to make the 75 I need, but if I were two people, you could make 50 in three hours, easy.
These Flowers are wonderful. Thank you for that fantastic tutorial.
Yna
How did you attach the leaves?
Where do you find streamers that are 4 inches wide??
Wow these are beautiful. What a great idea! I would love to try these with tissue paper that I have.
Such a fabulous tutorial . Have pinned it here https://pinterest.com/soniasv/flower-making-tutorials
Lovely flowers, I’ve been looking for different ways to make poppies for Rememberence Sunday-these will be brilliant! Thank you so much for sharing!