Forget Fake Store-Bought Flowers: A More Unique Way To Fill Vases With Personalized Bouquets

Claude Monet was right — you must have flowers, always and always. But sometimes, your favorite blooms are no longer in season, or your fresh picks from the grocery store meet an early demise. You can go the faux floral route for an enduring display, but they typically sport an unappealing plastic aesthetic. So instead, you should opt for pipe cleaner bouquets for lasting results, unique charm, and a wow factor that will impress everyone. (Keep those flower arranging hacks on hand, too — you'll need 'em, even with felt florals.)

An inexpensive and engaging DIY with surprisingly stunning results, felt bouquets prove that a little twisting and turning can go a long way. While the bouquet will lack maintenance, it certainly doesn't lack style, and the handmade element adds a whimsical touch to any vase or dining room table centerpiece. The key is to treat the bouquet the way you would a real one, creating a focal flower, fillers, and foliage to mix things up. Before you begin crafting, grab something like VZF's 200-piece multicolor pipe cleaners for plenty of colors to choose from. (And keep in mind that these DIYs make for a sentimental gift, especially for the gardeners in your life.)  

Of course, creating every flower will look different, but you can keep one thing consistent while crafting: the stem. Wrap a bamboo skewer or a bendable pipe wire in a green pipe cleaner to give your creation some structural support before focusing on the petals. The latter option will give the allusion of a real flower and allow you to play with this display when all is said and done, so consider going that route when possible. 

Regarding the petals, there are unique approaches to different types of florals: Daisies will require you to wrap a pipe cleaner around a small cylinder to create petals, whereas hibiscus will require you to bend, cut and gather smaller-sized pipe cleaners in batches before gluing them together to form one flower. Or, you can simply take a look at a photo of your favorite flower and try a freehand approach. Keep a glue gun on hand to adhere everything together, if need be. 

Equally as important as the felt florals themselves is the presentation, which deryatavas on YouTube proves by wrapping her roses in colored tissue paper and brown paper, tying it together with a bow. Meanwhile, she places her purple petals in a vase on top of doilies and books, just as you would the real deal. If you really want to get creative, you can take a viral DIY, which requires you to glue a vase to a picture frame to display real blooms, and replace them with your felt creations for a playful pop instead.