DIY Bride: the brooch boquet

I first saw a brooch bouquet while perusing one of the million and fifty wedding blogs I was addicted to casually browsing in search of inspiration. It took me a .02 seconds to realize I had to have one and immediately popped on over to Etsy to begin my search. I found several beautiful brooch bouquets… with big UGLY price tags. Determined to have one, I set out on a mission to make the bouquet.

I wanted my bouquet to have a lot of sentimental value, so I started gathering brooches from family members. I let my family and my future in-laws know what I was doing, sent them pictures of bouquets I found online and asked them if they could contribute to the effort. Everyone was excited to help and made it their mission to each give me a meaningful brooch. I loved every one of them but  when I realized my bouquet would require more (mine totaled 80 brooches), I headed out to flee markets.

**Special Wedding Tip: Exploit the fact that you are getting married. Every time I purchased a brooch, I let the person know it was for my wedding. This ALWAYS scored me a better deal. Also, buy as many from each vendors as possible; the more you buy, the more likely they are to make a deal.

Things You Will Need:

• Brooches (like I said before, mine took 80 to cover a 6” diameter sphere)
• Floral Wire—20lb—about $3 for 80ct. at Hobby Lobby (you will need as many wires as you have brooches)
• 6” Styrofoam Ball—$6 at Hobby Lobby
• 1” Dowel Rod—$.69 at Hobby Lobby
• 1” Satin Ribbon in whatever color ribbon you wish
• Hot Glue Gun and Glue
• Small Needle Nose Pliers

**Tip: You can print off 40% off coupons to most major craft stores online!

To Assemble:

Step One: Clean the brooches! If you’re like me and found most of your brooches as flea markets, chances are good they have several years worth of dust and dirt on them. To clean mine, I filled a big bowel with warm soapy water, brushed them with an old, soft bristle toothbrush, and then rinsed them in a colander. Very professional, I know, but it worked!

Step Two: Use the pliers to wire the back of each brooch with floral wire so that it looks like a flower with a stem.

Step Three: Cut down the wire from each brooch to about 3”

Step Four: Cut the dowel rod down to 9” long

Step Five: Cut a hole in the Styrofoam ball just a smidge smaller than the dowel rod’s diameter and about 2” deep. Fire up the glue gun, glue about the first inch of the dowel and push it into the Styrofoam. Make sure it’s good and sturdy because this bouquet weighs a ton.

Step Six: I organized my brooches into three categories: the sentimental brooches from family and friends, favorite brooches I had purchased, and my not so favorite “filler” brooches. Beginning with the not so favorites, push the wires into the Styrofoam until the brooch is firmly up against it. Continue to do this and evenly spread the not-so-favorites around. These act as “filler” so that you won’t see the Styrofoam once you get all your favorites in.

Step Seven: Repeat step five with all you favorites. Keep in mind the special brooches and their placement (i.e.: one from my fiancé I placed at the top so I could always see it, and ones from my family I placed on the sides so they would photograph well).

Hint! As you are placing brooches, turn the bouquet upside down and shake it gently, if any brooches come loose, grab the hot glue gun and glue the wire in.

Step Eight: Once all the brooches are in place, grab your ribbon. Cut it into 5” stands and begin to make loops at the base of the Styrofoam. To do this, glue about ½” of ribbon to the top of the dowel where it meets the Styrofoam, then double it over and glue the other end of the ribbon at the same point—continue this all the way around the base of the Styrofoam.

Step Nine: With the remaining ribbon, again glue ½” of ribbon to the dowel, this time starting at the bottom, and begin to spirally wrap the ribbon up the dowel, sporadically placing drops of glue on the dowel to hold the ribbon in place. Wrap the ribbon a few extra times at the top of the dowel to insure the ribbon loops are fully covered.

Step Ten: Find a vase tall enough to set you shiny bouquet in, step back and admire it. Then go do some push-ups because it probably weighs a ton!

Amanda McCain Himes, a Colorado native, made her own DIY wedding look like… well, a piece of cake.