Cenerpieces - Mock up and DIY Hanging Crystals

My florist will put these together and they will be a bit different in person - but I wanted to put together something myself so I could get an idea (directions for the crystals below the pics).

On wedding day, half the tables will have green hydrangea with white dahlias and the other half of the tables will have white hydrangea with green dahlias. Half will be in 9" square vases and the other half in 9" round vases. All of them will have a green leaf wrapped inside the vase so you cannot see the stems.

I also wired 120 crystals to put 5 hanging crystals at varying heights in each centerpiece.
I dont have a pic of all the crystals, but here is a very basic mock up of what I want - but it will be in different vases (bigger and wider) with real flowers - both hydrangea and dahlias- and one big leaf versus the little leaves I just pulled of the silk flowers. At least you can get the idea of the two different colored flowers with the hanging crystals in there.
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I was asked by another Knottie for directions and here is what I put together for her:

They are fairly easy to make although time consuming depending on how many you make.
I bought two different types of wire both from Michaels. One was silver and already in pre cut "sticks" in the floral section. This was the easiest to use as I could just cut them to the length I needed and they were straight. The second type of wire I tried was a deep pewter colored wire in the craft wire section. This was closer to the color wire I wanted, but came wrapped in a circle so I had to straighten each piece as I cut it which was very irritating but doable.

I also found the "crystals" at Michaels in the floral sections. A bunch came together in a clear plastic container. They already had a hole in them which is why I choose them. The two dangling crystals together were from the bead section - they sparkled a bit more but were more expensive, so I bought them in a sting of 8 and separated them into 4 bunches of 2 and only used one section of 2 per centerpiece - but you can really do what you want here.

I decided I wanted 5 hanging crystals in each centerpiece - 3 low and 2 high. I figured out with the height of my vases (9") that I needed 1-20", 1-18", and 3-14" pieces of wire per centerpiece - again you would just need to measure from the top of your vases and how far you want the wire to curve out.

I then cut each wire and curled the end around a needle nose pliers. I strung the crystal from the straight end down to the curled end.

As I finished stringing all the crystals, I pushed the straight end of the wire into floral foam in groupings of 5 so that I could easily give it to my florist to put in the centerpieces. I also created an instruction document for her explaining which pieces go in what centerpieces. (It does not explain how to make the crystals but rather how I wanted them put in the centerpieces - it also has close up pics of each crystal type I used). Let me know if you want the document and I can send it to you ([email protected])!

My total cost for making all 120 (including all the supplies) was $53.32 - I used Michaels coupons on many items but not all and did end up buying more than I used (trial and error on some of the wire).

Bouquet Inspiration

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I originally thought I wanted a bouquet of White Hydrangea, White Dahlias, with some Green Dendrobium Orchids. But I found this pic and love it so may need to pull some purple stock (I think that is what that is) into the mix – maybe purple stock with white Dahlias…