Make a Christmas crown with hips

Christmas is fast approaching. Not sure about you, but what I enjoy most at this time of year is decorating my house and garden. What if this year we swapped traditional fir crown for a beautiful crown of hips in shimmering colours? Let’s set off together for one last autumn harvest stroll and follow our step-by-step tutorial to make a superb Christmas crown.

autumn crown

1- What do I need?

Ready-to-use straw crown or flexible bush branches to make one yourself (wisteria, osier, hazel, vine woody climbing stems...).
Berries: hips, Cotoneaster lacteus or holly
Dried hydrangea flowers
Some dead oak leaves
Fine twine or floristry wire to wrap
Pair of scissors
Pruning shear to cut branches and harvest berries

autumn crown - step 1

2- How to make a Christmas crown?

Take ready-to-use crown. It is also possible and very easy to make one yourself. To do this, form circle with branches and secure together with garden string or with flexible stems.
Place some stems with berries on crown, then fix with fine twine (or wire) by wrapping around.

Add further berries, alternating with dried flowers and autumn leaves. Keep wrapping twine around crown and decorations to secure everything.

For final decorations, tuck stems under first layers, then wrap firmly with wire. Finish by knotting twine.
That’s it, crown is finished! Now fix on front door, hang on wall, or simply place on table as decoration.

3- Tips and advice

You can make a lovely branch crown with different bush varieties: willow, hazel or even the pretty red stems of dogwood. Branches pruned from garden bushes can also be used.
Many berries display orange-red tones at this time of year: hips, cotoneaster berries, ornamental crabapples and even physalis. You’ll likely find them in garden or during countryside walks.
For dried flowers, use gypsophila, honesty, statice, hydrangea heads and even ornamental grasses.
This decoration can also be made at end of October as autumn crown and left in place until Christmas.