Crafty Crease #15: Tissue Flower Trees

Imagine these all around the walls...magnificent!

Steph and I drove around the streets of Auckland desperately trying to find bare branches which I thought to use as a big and bold arrangement with lights and flowers.

However, there were no parks we could easily get to and anything remotely interesting seemed to be in plain sight and we didn't want to look dodgy.

We were almost despaired when I found myself in a narrow street and had to drive to the other end of it to turn around.

Lo and behold, Steph spotted a bank of flaxes and all their dying flower stalks.  She immediately launches up the bank and next thing you know, we had a car full of them.

Flax stalks are incredibly versatile and late Autumn, early winter is the best time to collect them.  When dry, they are incredibly light, cut off easily and are remarkably tall and straight.  When lined up along all the walls with just a bit of blu tac, you can easily create a forest feel.

We added the tissue flowers to aid the colour theme but they are beautiful and striking even without them.

Tissue Flowers

You need a lot of flowers to decorate a wall full of trees.  However, if you cut the several flower bases at a time you will have a pile in no time at all.  I cut about 6-8 layers at a time - anymore and the folding can become an issue.

To balance out the tree more I also had flower 'buds".   The smallest bud is just one flower base gathered up.  The medium size was 2 flower bases (usually two different colors).

To put the flowers on to the trees, Steph liked to squeeze them between the small branches.  I have found paperclips pretty useful too.

Below are a couple of other ways we used this technique: