DIY: HANGING FLORAL CHANDELIER

After an intense week in Sweden, promoting my book and showing how to make flower arrangements on TV4 (while wearing waaaaay too much make-up, haha), I thought it would be fun to show off a bit of my Brooklyn roots by posting the Floral Chandelier DIY/tutorial that I made for Design*Sponge a while back.

I was so excited when Grace Bonney gave me this opportunity and love that she supports us Brooklyn florists. It was such a fun project and I had a great time coming up with up with the concept, the story + step-by-step and shoot the pictures. Grace let me do whatever I wanted, so I loved the fact that I could use salvaged materials, make something that would last longer than a regular hanging chandelier (these flowers are in water), and create something rustic but still refined.

The process of creating this DIY was very similar to when we made my book Brooklyn Flowers and is something I really enjoy. Please see below for the full step-by-step, I hope you will enjoy it! You can also read it here.

From Design*Sponge:

Hanging floral arrangements are everywhere right now, and they are a really beautiful way to show off flowers. They are perfect for events such as a bridal or baby showers, or a special birthday or dinner party. This is a also a great way to still allow for a good amount of flowers even if your venue/room doesn’t have a lot of tables or surfaces!

Most of the hanging arrangements I have seen out there are either in floral oasis or not in water at all. For me, it was important to find a way to have the stems in water so that the flowers would stay fresh longer. I don’t use oasis because it contains a lot of chemicals. I also wanted to be able to use more delicate flowers and not have to limit myself to just sturdy flowers. We created a chandelier-style structure using floral water tubes and as a result, the arrangement we made lasted for days rather than hours. -Ingrid from Tin Can Studios

Materials Needed

For frame:
– Decorative punched sheet metal with holes big enough to push through a stem (we got ours at Lowe’s)
– 4 pieces of simple wood trim (we used salvaged wood that Recycled Brooklyn kindly gave us, you should check them out if you are looking for amazing salvaged wood furniture)
– Tin snips
– Hammer
– Nails
– Tack
– Strong twine or rope
  Alternatively, attach the sheet metal to an old frame if you don’t feel like building one!

For flower arranging:
– 3” floral water tubes with rubber caps (the type we used is made of recycled material and can be found online)
– Sharp floral clippers
– Seasonal flowers (we used lisianthius, ranunculus, blushing bride and viburnum)
– Vases with water for your flowers + to fill water tubes
– Clear soda, such as 7-up (not diet)
– Saw horse legs or two chairs to balance the frame on
– Strong twine, wire or rope for hanging the arrangement

Steps:

1. Start by building the frame. We built ours with scrap salvaged wood, but if you have an old frame, that is perfect, too! The easiest way to make the frame is to overlap the wood at the corners and nail the wood together. Then cut your sheet metal with tin snips, this is easy but keep in mind that the edges can be a bit sharp. Attach the metal to the frame with furniture tack, it will easily go through the sheet metal. Make sure everything is stable/sturdy enough for hanging.

2. Condition your flowers by removing all of the foliage and cutting them with sharp floral clippers. Immediately put them in clean vases with water. You can add a dash of clear soda, like 7-up, to help the flowers last a bit longer. Let the flowers drink for an hour or so.

3. Balance your sheet metal frame between two saw horse legs (or two chairs or tables). Make sure it is stable.

4. Fill the floral tubes with water by dunking them in a small bucket or vase. Attach the rubber caps to the tubes.

5. Take a flower and push the stem through an appropriate hole in the sheet metal. Once your stem is through the metal at a height you like, push it through the hole in the rubber cap and into the floral tube (above the metal sheet). We started by putting our flowers in the middle, then worked our way outwards. For an ombré effect, start from the left and move to your right. Hang each flower at different lengths so that each bloom is showing and not hiding another bloom.
Only push the stems halfway so the end of the stem stays in water, avoiding the air pocket above the water surface. Have the tubes filled to the brim, some water will squirt out when you push the stem into the tube. The water does not leak once the tubes and stems are in place/upside down. What is extra great about this frame/holder is that you can easily move your flowers around by pulling them out and pushing them back in another spot. Just be careful with more delicate stems!

6. Once you are pleased with your design, thread a piece of strong twine or rope through the corners of the frame and hang it from a couple of hooks in the ceiling!

Well conditioned flowers will last for at least one full day in normal temperature, the one we made lasted for three to four days.