Hang a Wreath to fill your home with holiday cheer. They’re made in circles, with no beginning or end, to symbolize the endless connection of family and friends dear! - Unknown
Go beyond table arrangements and dried bouquets and create lovely rustic wreaths and swags with what you have growing in your own landscape!
Creating Fall Wreaths With Your Fresh & Dried Autumn Bounty
After your cut flower gardens and landscaping borders have given up their bounty of fresh-cut blooms for your bouquets, there are still many crafty things awaiting you!
From seedheads to fall blooms, berries, evergreen foliage, and dried herbs and flowers that you’ve gathered earlier in the season - there’s plenty available to you to create lively wreaths to adorn your front entry, the door of your office, or to hang over your hearth!
Start now gathering bunches of greenery, berries, blooms at their peak, and bundles of seedheads from your garden while you are busy deadheading and cleaning up before the winter.
The Wreath Base
This goes for circular and oval wreaths, swags, tear-drops, crescent, rectangular/diamond, and heart-shaped. You can even make garlands to match!
If you are not starting with a store-bought wire or grapevine frame, then you need to make one. Trim vines and long supple stems, remove the leaves, then curl them into the bases for your wreaths, using pipe cleaners or wire to hold the tendrils or stems in place.
Start with the thickest part of the stem/vine and create a circle in the size you wish, tying each loop in three or four places per pass and securing new stems/vines as you add them. Weave smaller stems and vines among the larger ones to help bind them further. Twisting and twining the branches in the same spiraling direction.
For larger pieces, bunding straw in chicken wire, PVC, Styrofoam/Floral Foam, pool noodles, and more can be used as bulking additions and bases too!
Best Vines & Stems For The Base
- Birch
- Bittersweet Vines
- Cedar/Redcedar
- Curly Willow
- Dogwood Shrubs - Red/Yellow Twig
- Grapevine/Canes
- Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick
- Hop Vines
- Honeysuckle
- Ivy
- Poplar
- Trumpet Vine
- Wisteria
- Witch Hazel
- Willow Stems
Best Evergreens & Broadleaved Evergreens For Wreaths
Once the base is created, it’s time to add some further filler- or you can make the base itself with these incredible greens. Evergreens and broad-leaved evergreens are highly resinous and therefore long-lasting during the cold winter months outside. Misting with water and using anti-desiccants helps keep them from drying out for longer! Choosing fragrant stems enhances the outcome!
- Balsam
- Bay Leaves
- Boxwood
- Eucalyptus
- Douglas Fir
- False Cypress
- Juniper
- Hemlock
- Holly
- Magnolia Leaves
- Pine
- Privet
- Yew
Colorful Wreath Additions
Best Berries & Fruit For Wreaths
Adding a pop of color in the way of berries and fruit adds unexpected vibrancy to your greenery. When displayed outdoors, birds will reap the benefits too!
- Beautyberry
- Bittersweet
- Blackberry/Raspberry
- Chinese Lanterns
- Citrus Fruit - Fresh or Dried - Whole & Sliced
- Crabapples
- Eucalyptus
- Japanese Skimmia
- Juniper Berries
- Hawthorn
- Holly
- Hypericum (St. John’s Wort)
- Nandina
- Privet Berries
- Rose Hips
- Snowberry
- Viburnum
- Winterberry
Dried Seeds & Seedheads
Fall is the perfect time to gather your wreath décor!
- Alder
- Allium
- Billy Buttons (Craspedia)
- Broomcorn
- Clematis Seed Pods
- Columbine
- Golden Rain Tree
- Hops
- Lotus
- Magnolia Seed Pods
- Money Plant (Lunaria)
- Nigella
- Nuts From Nut Trees
- Ornamental Grass Seed Plumes
- Pine Cones of All Kinds
- Ping Pong Scabiosa
- Pomegranates
- Poppy Seed Pods
- Sea Holly
- Sweet Gum
- Sycamore
- Teasels
Best Dried Flowers
Harvest now and start drying blooms for your bouquets! Many flowers can be dried by hanging them in bunches, pressing them between the pages of a heavy book, or dried in a granular desiccant. Then tie in or glue them in last so you handle their delicate petals the least.
- Amaranth
- Astilbe
- Baby’s Breath
- Bachelor's Buttons/Cornflower
- Calendula
- Cardoon (Cynara)
- Celosia/Cock’s Comb
- Delphinium/Larkspur
- False Saffron (Carthamus)
- Globe Amaranth
- Gomphrena
- Hydrangea
- Lavender
- Lollipop Verbena
- Ornamental Grass Plumes
- Roses
- Sea Holly
- Statice
- Sunflower Heads
- Strawflower
- Tansy
- Yarrow
- Zinnias
Gorgeous Wreath Décor!
Once you’ve assembled your goodies, use pipe cleaners in natural colors, floral wire or floral tape, and hot glue to put it all together. Don’t forget a wreath hanger and some ribbons and bows to finish your design!
If you are using an evergreen filler, tie in your fall fruit and seed additions in a way that makes them easy to remove and change out for more winter holiday-themed items later on!
Remember that if you are hanging your wreath outdoors, including birdseed and suet treats for your feathered friends - making your wreath serve as a pretty songbird hotspot!
Beautiful rustic dried wreaths, swags, and garlands await you from your hard work all growing season! Fresh and dried garden bounty is only limited by your imagination! Beautify your home or office, or start making some very unique gifts for loved ones with the personal touches only your unique garden has to offer!
Nature Hills is here to help you have all the outdoor and indoor beauty and squeeze every bit of enjoyment from your landscape!
Happy Planting!
