How To Make Beaded Flowers

This set of beaded flowers is a part of a bigger project that I'm making. I did this first because it's the part that's a bit longer to finish. It's easy to make but I can't say that it's quick, I think it took me about 2 hours to finish just one flower, but maybe it's just me, because I always watch movies or TV shows when doing craft projects, so I'm not so focused.

This is commonly called French Beaded Flowers which from what I gathered is the name of the technique used which is threading beads into the wire and wrapping the beaded wire around a foundation row or frame to form the petals. The flowers you can make can be used as a home decor, which is what I'm making this project for, an accessory, a jewelry design, or a beautiful bouquet, I've actually seen pictures of bridal bouquets made with beads. So if you think this is a project worth your time, check out how I made these beaded flowers.

These are the things needed:

Wire (I used a 24 gauge wire but I think 26 gauge is better, only I don't have enough 26 so I used 24 instead.)

Seed beads

Wire cutter

Chain nose or round nose pliers

Floral tape (optional)

I still didn't have an idea how much wire I would be needing so I just cut about 16 inches as a start, then twisted and formed the wire into the foundation frame as shown in the picture above. I now have something like a deformed letter Y with one short tail and a very long one. I just also winged that part basing on the size of the petal I was planning to make, so, that lower part with two strands twisted together, which is going to be the stem is about 3 inches long and that shorter tail is about 1.5 inches.

I started with a row of beads in the center, which is the base where the beaded wire will be wrapped around.

Then, I threaded beads in the long tail, pushed the beads towards the base, just enough beads to form a row on the side of the base beads, and wrap the wire on top of the base. This is where you can start to form the shape of the petal you want, if you want a rounder petal, just form a half circle string of beads, if you want a pointed petal, wrap the wire on top with the angle pointing up.

I did the same on the other side, it's now looking a bit like a petal.

I just continued adding beads and going up on one side, wrapping the wire, and going down on the other side and securing the same way, until I reached  the size I want for the petal.

Before cutting the excess wire from both ends, I secured them by giving the tails another wrap and twist.

One petal down, more to go. The number and sizes of the petals will depend on the flower you want to make. What I was making requires lots of petals with different sizes so I made several more petals of various sizes. I used a different bead color on the outer row to emphasize the edge of the petal, so each petal would still be clearly seen even when they're already grouped together to form the flower.

Another way of making petals is starting off with threading lots and lots of beads into the wire without cutting it from the spool and form the foundation frame, the one that looks like a letter Y, this way you can just go on and wrap the beaded wire around that frame, continue doing so and just cut the wire after you formed your desired petal size. I just didn't do this method since my spool of wire is so big and it's getting in the way of my work. 

This is what I said earlier about how to form the shape of the petal, the one on the right which is still in progress on the picture above started off with rounder rows compared to the finished one because I wanted this new one to be round.

And these are the petals I made for a single flower, four groups of different sizes. The smallest petals used up about 15 inches of wire, the next smallest ones, 20 inches, the next group, 27 inches, and the biggest petals, 40 inches, those measurements would leave a long enough tail of wire to work with to secure the ends.

I gave the petals a little bend here and there to add form and a bit of effect to the stiff shape.

Then it's time to assemble the flower. I started with the smallest petals, positioned them to form a small bud and twisted their stems together.

I just kept adding petals, one at a time, based on their sizes, smallest to biggest, and wrapping the stem around the other wires already wrapped together until all the petals are attached.

Some of the petals on the outer part were still a little loose so I wrapped a wire around the stems to tighten and secure the petals.

I cut the stem shorter for the flower to fit the place where I'll be putting it and wrapped it with floral tape. You can skip wrapping it with floral tape if you want a twisted wire look or you can use other materials like ribbon or paper tape.

The flower I made is actually done for its purpose but I'll just show how to make one with a longer stem, something that can be placed in a vase. 

One way, and I think, the best way is to start off with petals with longer stems, so if from the start you know that you need a flower with a long stem, make the stems of the petals' foundation frame long, not just 2 or 3 inches. 

Another way is to attach a stick or a rod to the flower, that is when, like what I have here, you made your flower using short stemmed petals. Attach the stick or rod by wrapping wire around it and the flower's stem like when you're securing a splint. As shown in the picture, I used about five or six strands of wire with thicker gauge twisted together because I don't have a rod or a stick available.

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I also made a few leaves and attached them to the stem.

I then wrapped floral tape around the stem starting from the top, again, you can use other materials here like a ribbon or yarn.

I wanted to make the stem sparkly so I wrapped a beaded wire around it, I guess it looks cute although the stem looks thicker now.

So, all of this is just a part of another project, that means there's still work to be done. It honestly took me hours to finish but it's so worth my time and effort, I love how the flowers turned out. 

Thanks for visiting and if you have any questions or something to share about this entry, please feel free to leave a comment. Have a great day!