Drying Flower Stems for Fall

The thing that I've always hated about fresh flowers is how hard they are to keep alive, and how wasteful it feels to throw them away when they die. I really wanted to try drawing flower stems to extend their life a bit longer!

I started out with a somewhat fresh bouquet of flowers. You might recognize these flowers from my kitchen renovation reveal. They were about a week and a half old when I started this process. In total, it took about 3 weeks to dry them out enough for me to feel comfortable displaying them.

Ideally, you want to dry these outside so the natural air can help draw out all of the moisture, but I didn't feel comfortable doing that with all the fires happening and the onslaught of spiders my yard seemed to get this year.

Since I couldn't try the flowers outside, I hung them up and my office bathroom using some Baker's twine and a couple of tacks. If you don't have a narrow room like my bathroom to hang your flowers try utilizing an empty corner of your home. I don't recommend laying them flat against a wall if you don't have to to avoid one side of the flowers being very flat.

Cut a string long enough to hold all the flowers for your bouquet. You're going to want to make sure that each stem has enough space in between for air to flow through and so that way they don't end up drying attached to each other. Cut smaller pieces of string to tie around the stems of the flowers to attach to the larger string for hanging. If you tie the strings tight enough, there shouldn't be a risk of them falling off the strings. Almost all flowers will have small ridges where leaves had been cut off to help hold the string in place.

Flowers take about 3 weeks to dry depending on the humidity level of your location, your elevation, and the time of year you're choosing to dry your flowers. I live in California Central valley, which is known for being dry and hot most of the year. While this bathroom doesn't typically get a lot of airflow it also rarely sees any moisture and I am usually the only person that uses this bathroom, which also made it the perfect spot for drying.

Different flowers also have different moisture levels, and can also take different amounts of time to dry. It's really a waiting game of a craft and you just have to be patient. Once you feel that they're dry enough, remove them from the string and style them in your favorite vase.

I've been loving the wildflower and weeds look that a lot of contemporary designers have been using in their homes lately, so I am absolutely loving the vibe that my bouquet is having in its second life!

I really hope this encourages you to find a new use for your flowers before throwing them away. I wish I had started this process a lot sooner so I could have saved more flowers from this bouquet. It's given me a new look at getting the case of flowers going forward! If you try this project, let me know in the comments down below and be sure to tag me on Instagram (@withlovejoey)!