Which brooch bouquet method did you use?

sarahjane222 · September 2014

There's the styrofoam ball, using an armature, or just putting stems on each jewel and wrapping the stems together. Which method did you use and would you recommend (or not recommend) using one method over another?

duhitsd · September 2014

I decided to use some real touch flowers with mine so I don't have all brooches. Since I decided I wanted flowers the easiest way for me to do that was to wire each piece so it had a stem and just added it in with the flowers. If you want to see a picture, I posted about it here

emster86 · September 2014

I'm also doing this with some real touch/fake flowers. Haven't attempted it yet, but I bought some wire "stems" (http://www.joann.com/panacea-products-20-gauge-green-stem-wire-30-pcs/3989688.html#q=wire+stem&start=5) to play around with and some floral tape. I thought I would just see if it works and if it doesn't I only wasted a couple of $'s. Good luck! If I can try it soon I'll let you know how it goes!

PrincessOfHavoc · September 2014

Individual stems. Both other methods were noisy, Styrofoam ball sounded like Santa's reindeer on energy drinks doing a kick line while in flight.

You will trash your hands. But that's normal to me as I am a manager for a hardware store.

For the twisting, I used a drill with a paint opener. Loop tails around opener, drill (it doesn't take much), snip off. Keep it flexible to keep from the wires from snapping when moved.

I did double wire everything, so four lengths of wire. Two are twisted together, then second set is twisted. Gives me a back up wire. Abusing a hideous brooch, I tried everything short of driving over it to break both sets. Hitting it with a softball bat into concrete block broke the brooch but wires were fine.

These are heavy! I added in various beaded floral type picks to fill in and slightly reduce the weight. But mine is a good 13 pounds. MOH is carrying a tiny one at 2 pounds by request with being hugely pregnant.

I just cut a roll of stainless wire to open the roll, giving me 8 billion wire pieces. Stainless supports brooches better than floral wire I found. Plus any gaps will be shiny silver looking material vs green. Also used teflon tape instead of floral tape. Green was showing through ribbon, white does but it looks nicer. My ribbons are semi sheer gray under a sheer black.

Plastic dipped the ends to keep from stabbing myself while in dress. Which I would so do given my skills at bleeding.

I built mine "wrong". I made mini bouquets of 5-7 brooches as I found that easier to get everything smooth. Any odd spots got beaded.

chkmeowt · September 2014

I used this tutorial for stemming each brooch/earring/piece http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Brooch-Bouquet Once everything was wired, my friend and I made the bouquet using a faux hydrangea bouquet as the base, to keep the general shape. Basically she just fed each stem into the bouquet, covering all the flowers. Once they were all arranged how we liked it, she used a rubber band to keep it all bunched and tight, until she did the real wrapping (like any bouquet).

[Deleted User] · September 2014

I am going to attempt to make one. FI cousin just got married and they used the ball. They used dowels and lots of glue. It was really pretty and stayed really well.

lookame3639 · September 2014

I wired each brooch/piece individually. I had my fiance hold the wires and i twisted each brooch until the wires were twisted all the way up. My mom helped arrange them and I tied them all together. I honestly love my bouquet. It has brooches from my grandma who recently passed, some from my mom's collection, a few new and some from antique malls. Fiance and my son are wearing brooches as their bootienere (pardon the spelling).

futuretaylor2215 · November 2014

I am using the styrofoam ball. I have not started yet though.

Kahlyla · November 2014

debmonn said:

I used this tutorial for stemming each brooch/earring/piece http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Brooch-Bouquet Once everything was wired, my friend and I made the bouquet using a faux hydrangea bouquet as the base, to keep the general shape. Basically she just fed each stem into the bouquet, covering all the flowers. Once they were all arranged how we liked it, she used a rubber band to keep it all bunched and tight, until she did the real wrapping (like any bouquet).

That is a really brilliant idea!

I made one as a bridesmaid, following the bride's instructions, which used the styrofoam ball method. It worked quite well, but I did end up reinforcing everything with hot glue and extra pearl-topped pins and such (the glue was just applied lightly to the stabby part before the stabby part was insert into the styrofoam, if that makes sense. The principle was just like using glue to build wooden furniture - it stays hidden, and it's screws and nails that really do the work, but the glue is there to give extra support).

Which brooch bouquet method did you use?

Re: Which brooch bouquet method did you use?

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