Valentine’s Day comes at the moment I need it most. By February, wooly socks and furry blankets have begun to lose their magic. Even if warmer days are weeks away, I appreciate the promise that Valentine’s Day brings (and whether I have a special Valentine or not, I use the holiday as an excuse to indulge in a little flower-shaped pick-me-up). In that spirit, here’s how to create wall vases with nothing more than a few medicine vials, a nail, a length of twine, and blooms from the florist.
Photographs by Erin Boyle.
Above: I love how the scale of the tiny spirea blossoms matches the miniature size of the vials.
Above: Last weekend, I headed to my favorite neighborhood flower shop, GRDN, and came home with an armload of goodies that say springtime: quince branches and spirea, freesia, and ranunculus.
Above: I have a set of vintage medicine vials that I’ve been using lately as miniature hanging flower vessels and I recently discovered that the Container Store carries modern-day versions in three different sizes at prices ranging from 99 cents to $1.49 apiece. Surface area is at a premium in our Brooklyn apartment; rather than crowding things with an oversized bouquet, I like the idea of hanging flowers in smaller doses.
Above: The threads in the top of the glass where the cap usually goes are the perfect place to secure your thread–and because the vials are so lightweight, there’s no need to search for studs before you hang them up.
Above: After adding loops of string to the vials, I put them on the floor and filled them with my booty from the flower shop. Adding flowers can make the small vials top heavy, so you might prefer to fill them after they’re hung on the wall. I used quince blossoms and spirea in the tiniest vials, and I added ranunculus and freesia to the larger ones.
Above: On the wall above our kitchen table, I interspersed my vials with a favorite Czech postcard and with old family photos. That’s my great-cousin dancing with his sweetheart.
Above: I strung larger vials in our sunny window frame and alongside our curtain.
Above: In some cases, I hung two or three vials together on the same nail to create a slightly larger arrangement.
Above: I don’t know about you, but I’d take subtle additions of peaches and pinks over a dozen red roses any day of the week, and on Valentine’s Day, especially.
Want to try more of Erin’s DIY projects? For our favorites, see DIY: Bottle-Fed Paperwhites and DIY: A Grapefruit Birdfeeder for Our Feathered Friends.
N.B. This is an update of a post originally published on February 14, 2013.
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