Making Carnations From Twine Paper and Wrinkled Paper

Tired of buying new flowers every week for your home decoration? Want to find some fun during spare time? Why not try to make a fake carnation by yourself. This instruction should provide you with clear steps to make a carnation.

Materials:

70 cm Pink twine paper

15 cm*15 cm Green wrinkled paper

1 Green Floral Tape

1 Craft Glue (Optional)

8 cm*8 cm White Tissue Paper

1 Stem Wire #18

Step 1: Choosing Your Carnation Size

Cut the rolled-up pink twine paper into several 7 centimeters long pieces.

The twine paper is already 8 centimeters wide so you should have approximately 7 cm*8 cm rectangular pieces after you unroll each twine paper.

You can decide how many pieces of twine paper you need for your carnations depending on the size of your design.

In this tutorial, I used 10 pieces of twine paper to make a mini carnation.

Step 2: Choosing Your Petal Size

Cut 2-3 pieces shaped like a small tree shown in the picture for each piece of twine paper.

Forming the petals should be the most challenging part of this design, since you will have to cut a minimum of 20 pieces of these small parts.

Remember, you need to include large, medium, and small sized petals.

The outer layer petals on your carnations should be large enough to cover the inner layer.

The size of each petal should not be identical to each other to ensure natural flower-like appearance.

Step 3: Cutting Your Petal Edge

Cut the edges of your petals into a jagged outline.

Tip: Start by cutting small lines on the round edges of your petal in one direction like figure one above. Then flip the petal over and hold your scissors in the same direction and cut the edge again. As a result, you will have jagged edges as shown in figure two. Repeat this step for every petal.

Step 4: Twisting Your Petal

Twist the long tail of the tree-shaped twine paper into a stem. As a result, more wrinkles will appear on the petal. After this, your petal will be shaped like a spoon instead of a small tree.

Repeat this step on every petal you have cut.

Now, we have finished all the preparations for petals. Our next step is to make the stem.

Step 5: Making the Stem

Create the stem by twining the floral tape on to the green stem wire.

Make sure you bind the floral tape tightly to prevent making a thick stem.

Now we will need the prepared petals for the next step.

Step 6: Adding Petals

Select your four smallest petals for the inner layer and stick them onto one end of the stem.

It is recommended to have four petals in each layer.

The first two layers (eight pieces) of petals should be placed really tight to prevent a hole from forming in the center.

Tip: If the petals are not tight enough, you can even squeeze them since the real carnation is tight in the center.

This step completes the center of the carnation. The remaining step is to add more layers of petals to increase the size of your flower.

Step 7: Making Your Calyx

Before making the calyx of the carnation, cut the extra parts of the petals that extend longer than the floral tape that keeps it attached to the stem.

Now, fold the 8 cm*8 cm tissue paper to match the length of your floral tape at the end of the petals.

Then wind the folded tissue onto your floral tape so as to form the base of your calyx.

Use a little tape to stick the ends of the tissue paper together to make the next step easier.

Step 8: Making Your Sepal Part

The wrinkled paper is used for the sepals and leaves of the carnation.

Therefore, we will need three pieces of 6 cm*7 cm and one piece of 5 cm*7 cm in total.

Take out the 5 cm*7 cm wrinkled paper and cut one side into a jagged shape.

Make sure that you have at least four to five tips in your jagged edge so you can twine it into a closed loop.

Step 9: Finalizing Your Calyx

Wrap the jagged wrinkled paper from step 8 onto the tissue paper and hold it while winding the floral tape on it.

You do not want to tape the whole tissue paper portion because you have to control the length of your calyx balanced to the size of your flower.

Typically, leave the size of your calyx as long as one of your petal length should be enough.

After adjusting the length of your calyx, tape over the tissue paper part with floral tape.

The critical point here is to create a sudden decrement at the end of the calyx because a gradually fading out calyx is not like carnations in nature.

By now, you have done 80% of the carnation design and the rest of it is very easy to follow.

Step 10: Adding Leaves on the Stem

Take out the three 6 cm*7 cm wrinkled papers from the step 8.

You can make two leaves from each 6 cm*7 cm wrinkled paper.

Cut the leaves similar to the figure as shown above. The size of these leaves do not have to be identical to each other. There are two ways to stick the leaves onto the stem.

Method 1: Twist 1/3 of each leaf so they can act as a handle for connection. Then use the floral tape to stick these leaves on the stem.

Method 2: Use craft glue to stick 1/3 of the leaves directly onto the stem instead of having to twisting the ends of the leaves mentioned in method one. However, floral tape is still needed to cover up the connection part of the leaves with glue. I did not use this method this time, so pictures for this method will not be provided.