How to Use Carnations in Floral Arrangements

You can use carnations as fillers or the main attraction in a floral arrangement.

Carnations are a popular flower of choice for flower arrangements. This is typically due to the fact that carnations are inexpensive and you can dye the petals to suit the color you desire. While your own creativity is the building block for your floral arrangements, these steps will guide you on using carnations to add a standout element to your design.

Things You'll Need

• Carnations
• Scissors
• Glass containers
• Food coloring
• Paper towels
• Water
• Vase or basket

Instructions

Dying White Carnations

1. Put a stopper in the kitchen sink and fill it with about three inches of cool water. Submerge the stems of the white carnations in the water and cut the stems off, at an angle, about two inches from the end. This opens the stem up with a clean cut for the dye to flow through and submerging the stems, while cutting helps keep out air bubbles.

2. Fill glass containers (jars work best) with enough cool water to cover the stems about two inches up from the bottom, but don't put the stems in just yet. Place 30 or more drops of food coloring in the jars, with each jar holding a different color. Stir the water well.

3. Place the white carnations stems in the jars, taking care to make sure they are submerged about two inches up the stem. Depending on the results you want, the process may take anywhere from 30 minutes to a few hours. However, the carnations will show the maximum results after 24 hours. There will still be white showing, but the petals will take on the color of the dye at the tips of the petals and streaked in the petal veins.

4. Remove the carnations from the vases when you attain the desired look and wrap the stems in paper towels to soak up excess dye and avoid staining your counter tops or flooring.

Arranging Carnations

1. Use carnations as an accent in a flower arrangement with a large variety of flower types. Carnations make a great base flower, creating a boundary around the edge of the arrangement. Carnations that provide complementary colors draw the viewer to the other flowers in these types of arrangements.

2. Consider carnations as a filler flower. Adding them to a floral arrangement that seems to have holes or lacking structure can bring the piece together without taking away from the other flowers in the arrangement. You can accomplish this with both regular-size carnations and mini carnations.

3. Create a floral arrangement that feature only carnations. Placing three or four carnations with long stems in a bud vase with baby's breath and fern as fillers and a bow around the vase is a common flower arrangement given to families with a new baby. Another option would be to place a dozen or more carnations of complementary colors in a basket with the same small fillers.

Tips & Warnings

• Dying carnations allows you to obtain bright, beautiful colors you may not find naturally. However, make sure that your color choices go well together and complement the colors of other flowers used in the bouquet. Carnations are typically more of an accent flower, rather than the main feature, so you don't want to detract from the roses or lilies that should really catch the eye.

• After some time in fresh water that doesn't contain food coloring, dyed carnations may lose some of their added color as it cycles out into the clean water through the stem. For that reason, dyed carnations may not be the best selection for bouquets meant to last more than a few days.

References

• The Flower Expert: Making Carnation Bouquets By Oneself
• Dave's Garden: Dying Carnations -- A Fun Project with Kids

Resources

• Find tips on creating a flower arrangement.