DIY Tutorial - Hanging Floral Chandeliers

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Morning, babes and happy Friday to y'all!

I'm SO psyched to share today's DIY tutorial with you! We've been obsessing over hanging flowers for a while now, one way or another. Be it bundled dried blooms, tied with brown string and hung from the rafters of a barn, flower garlands trailing through the woods, or (and this one deserves caps and emboldening) FLORAL CHANDELIERS.

I mean! What's not to love?!

Above eye level decor? Check. (We're obsessed with giving decor height, it really brings a space to life)

Chandelier? Like seriously, what else?! CHECK.

Flowers? Umm, hello we're Festival Brides, of COURSE flowers!

D'ya see where I'm coming from here?! In short, we just had to create this DIY, and man alive did we have fun with it! A huge shoutout to my beau, Old Bear Media, for the shots, he was a dream to work with, as always. Ha, not biased, at all [insert flushed face emoji here]

Now, just before we get into it (I see you there, champing at the bit the moment I mentioned flowers and chandeliers!) I need to just mention a couple of things:

One: did y'all know that voting for the Wedding Blog Awards closes today at 5pm (BST)?! Ahem, did I mention how stoked we'd be if you voted for us?! Click here to vote!

Two: I just need a second to talk about the nail polish I'm wearing in this tutorial. If you're a bride looking for the perfect off-white shade, no shimmer, glitter or faff, this shade is for you! Enter: Butter London's Cream Tea.

Do it, thank me later!

Let's kick this bad boy into action then!

...I'm not sure 'bad boy' was quite the right phrasing for a super girly, floral chandelier, but let's roll with it!

Silk foliage - I bought 6 bundles of eucalyptus style stems in addition to the leaves that came with the blooms
Silk flowers - go for an odd number (way more aesthetically pleasing in terms of flower arranging) I went for 5 big white blooms in 2 different styles, 3 medium sized green blooms in 2 different styles and a 4 smaller 'filler' flowers. This is your chance to make it your own and make it fit your theme!
A wire wreath ring - mine was courtesy of a childhood friend's floristry, The Garden Rose, (thanks, girl!), but you can get them on Amazon in varying sizes, we went for a 16″
Florist's wire - I just used what we had lying around, which was actually a little too thick for the task, but again, you can get this from your local florist or have a look at the selection on Amazon
Wire cutters
Brown string - we were going for a rustic vibe, but feel free to swap this out for your preferred alternative, or even invisible thread for a suspended look!
Scissors
Your fiancée - (optional, but they'll sure make the finishing touches easier to make!)
Donuts - (optional, but highly recommended)

Now you're all set, let's start buy getting that string attached!

We debated whether to do this first or last, but I'm so glad we resolved to go for it first, because by the time your ring is filled with flowers, you'd be hard pushed to get these knots in the right place and secure!

Ok, so you're gonna want a minimum of 3 strands, you might even wanna go for 5 if you've used a bigger hoop for the sake of stability and to bear the weight of the flowers - they're surprisingly heavy! You'll also wanna think about where you plan to hang your chandelier and therefore how long your strands need to be.

Measure 3 strands of your desired length of brown string (I went for 1 metre long)
Tie them at the perpendicular points (which also happen to land at roughly thirds, handy hey?!) on the wreath wire, simply using a double knot
Extra tip: dot the knot with super glue, letting it soak into the string and dry to ensure that knot ain't going nowhere!

Next you're gonna tie the top knot.

Hold the wire off the surface to get the balance right, you wanna start with the wreath ring nice and flat and your three strands all the same length.
Now, assuming you're looking to hang the chandeliers from hooks, using around 4 inches of the string, loop and knot it.

That's your structure ready to hang.
Now to get adding the flowers!

Using wire cutters, prep the all the foliage you plan to use by cutting into single stems or smaller, manageable bundles

Eeek, this is the exciting bit!

Though, I should totally add a little disclaimer at this point: for any florists reading, I am no professional, hell even the word 'amateur' is a little ambitious, but I found this method to work just fine!

Now, let's get building this wreath!

Cut yourself a load of lengths of wire, you'll need at least one per stem, I used lengths of around 15cm
Take yourself a single stem or small bunch of foliage and position it on the wire ring
Begin to wrap the florist wire around the stem in a spiral motion, leaving a little stem at the end
Once you've done 3 wraps of with the floristry wire, come back on yourself, overlapping the first wraps of wire (see the images below for a little more clarity!)

You see the little crosses we're making with the wire? They just help keep it all in place a little better!

Work your way around the wire ring, adding foliage at intervals to create the basis of your chandelier
I worked round in a clockwise direction, always placing the foliage in the same direction to get a sense of flow around the ring, but you can totally mix it up if you fancy a little more of a dishevelled/fuller look to the wreath, try it out!

Once you've added the majority of the foliage in this manner, position your main big blooms as you wish (I evenly space ours around the ring) and wire into place. Remember that your wreath is gonna be viewed from the side, or even underneath if you're hanging really high, so be conscious of that when positioning these feature blooms
Now start filling in the gaps! I found it really helpful at this point to employ my lovely hubby to hang the chandelier, that way I could look at it from the side and from a little distance: it'll show you any gaps and a help you get a better feel for its shape
At this point, you also wanna start using as little wire as possible, as these final stems are gonna be more on show than those you initially attached, and we don't want to see a load of wire on the finished product!

So, it's just a case of rinse and repeat, until all your blooms and foliage are attached!

Then tweak, tweak, tweak et voilà! Your chandelier is ready to hang!

I mean, is it not super pretty?!

In terms of styling: we hung ours quite low over the dessert table, as it brought it down to almost eye level (for my 6ft hubby at least! My 5ft 2 frame? Not so much!), plus ours looked at its finest from the side. It's also important to make sure you mirror some of the colours and textures you've used for the chandelier in the decor below, just to tie it all in!

As for where to hang this beauty, the possibilities are endless! Over a dessert table (obvs!), or how about three of them over the top table? Having your ceremony in a barn? They'd look divine hanging from the eaves, or even tied from a branch in a woodland.

They're super versatile and a perfect blend of rustic natural elements and the glamorous chandelier!

And can we just talk about the donut tower?! Needless to say, that did not stick around long once we were done shooting!