How to Use Floral Tape

Floral tape helps transform a couple of blooms from your garden into an expensive-looking corsage.

Flowers from your own garden or the grocery store cooler can look like expensive florist bouquets with the proper presentation. Floral tape is used in flower arranging and corsage making to bundle blooms together securely, strengthen stems with wire, and neatly finish ends. Learn how to use floral tape correctly for a professional look to your arrangements.

Things You'll Need

• Floral tape
• Scissors
• Added extras, such as beaded wire
• Silk or fresh flowers

Instructions

1. Choose the best color of floral tape for your item. It comes in white or green and in widths of 1/2 inch to 1 inch. The tape has a waxy texture and is stretchy.

2. Pick up a flower you are strengthening with wire by the stem. Hold the tape against the top of the wire, behind the thick part at the base of the flower where the wire starts, and twirl the stem as the tape wraps around and up the stem or stems if combining more flowers together. Pull slightly to stretch the tape as your wrap. Make sure the tape slightly overlaps itself as you wrap -- wrapping at a 45-degree angle is recommended. Tear off the end after wrapping with a little to spare and wrap it back down the stem. It will stick to itself but not to you.

3. Trim the stems of several small flowers to about 2 inches to make a corsage, or add some larger flowers and leave the stems 6 to 8 inches long for a handheld bouquet. Wrap each stem with tape as describes in Step 1. Bundle the three flowers together, arranged several short lengths of foliage and filler flowers, like baby's breath, between and around them. Wrap tape around the entire bundle, starting from the bottom and keeping the bundle tightly together. Tear off the end, leaving a tail, and wrap down the bundle slightly to secure. ape can also hold larger bundles together.

4. Cut off a length of ribbon in a color complementary to the flowers. Wrap the ribbon up the stems to hide the tape, securing the ends under the ribbon.

Tips & Warnings

• Practice on something you don't plan to use a few times before using your good flowers.

• This tape dries out over time, so if you only use it for say Christmas arrangements or such, you might need new stock.

• The tape must be stretched, or it does not stick to itself.

• If the tape breaks as you stretch, just restart with a slight overlap at the break point.

References

• Rutgers University: Tools for Floral Arranging
• University of Vermont Horticulture Department: Taping Wire Stems

Resources

• Sierra Linda High School: How to Make a Homemade Corsage
• Kansas State University: Pen Bouquet