Pages of Style #2: Books in Bloom

Welcome to the first post looking at ways that I can turn pages from a Shakespeare play into beautiful decorations for me, and hopefully also inspire some of my wonderful reads to give paper crafting a go.


When I began the search for what I could do with old copies of the comedy, the first idea I came across was  to turn the pages into flowers; they offer a great range of options, especially as they would be suitable for both ceremony and reception.

Paper rose
made with individual petals

Clockwise from top right: 1) Carnation,
2)Big orchid style flower, 3) Lilies, 4) Tulips,
5) Daisy with buttons, 6) Little flowers with bead
7) Cone flowers

There are plenty of options if you want to include paper flowers in a wedding,

An early decision would be what type of flower you want to create; Do you want a real looking design or opt for a more styled choice? Are they going to take the place of all flowers, contrast or mirror you living choices? It is also worth considering how big you want your flowers: life-sized, mini, over sized or a mixture?

There are plenty of ideas and types of flowers online:

Roses, tulips, lilies,carnations, daisies, orchids - a bit of time and you can find a way to recreate most flowers.

You also need to consider available time and artistic ability, different styles and sizes would involve different techniques.

Roses

I really want to include roses during my wedding and I have discovered that there are 3 basic ways to create a rose from paper: By cutting and gluing individual petals, cutting and gluing a circular spiral and origami.

My handmade rose gift box.

A few weeks ago I wanted to make a rose as a decoration as part of a gift for a friend. At first I tried origami and I discovered a new level of confused.
I then tried the individual petal technique, with which I did succeed and was rather impressed with the result.

This rose was made from white printer paper, which I then painted with a creamy/white paint and sprinkled with glitter. I finished it with a couple of leaves made from glitter paper with a green tinge.

Alternative ways to make paper roses:
 1) Swirly Rose made from a continuous piece of paper. 2) Origami Rose

How to include paper flowers

 As I'm getting married in winter the paper option is quite appealing as it could save lots of money on out of season flowers, although I will have to careful as they can be very time consuming to make. There are many ways which paper flowers can be included during a wedding; from the traditional floral displays: on tables in the reception, pew ends, windowsills, on the altar or arch over the door in the church and as personal flowers in bouquets, buttonhole or even in the brides or bridesmaids hair. You could give them to guest as part of their place settings, as favors. 

Ways to include paper flowers: 1) Floral decoration in vase, 2) Colourful bouquet of mixed flowers,
3) Book table center with Rose and Lily, 4) Gift boxes decorated with various paper flowers

Paper rose decoration ideas: 1) Rose button hole 2) Rose hairclip 3) beautiful bouquet 4) personalised gift bags

Stylised Rose using a mix of papers

For my final pictures, I wanted to share with you two twists on the book page rose:  A beautiful fluffy rose with jewel center, made from books, sheet music, plain and decorated paper - I could see this making a lovely alternative corsage for Mum/sisters or as a hair piece for a bride or bridesmaid.

Colour stained Roses

The second being these stunning coloured roses, I assume they have simply run the cut edges over an ink pad to create the stain and then
assembled the rose as normal.

I have to say I have found this post blooming marvelous (groan...) to research and compose - there are so many beautiful creations and ideas out there, for the style of flower and their uses; I could have continued on for days.


I guess my task now is to go away and have a go, I want to try and make some big (ish) roses from book pages to see how they turn out - I will share my results and maybe my method (if it's successful) with you soon.

TTFN ~ Kate xx