How to make a Christmas centerpiece with greenery

A classic evergreen Christmas centerpiece is a beautiful addition to any holiday table. Follow along these steps for making your own, and see just some of the options you might try to customize an evergreen centerpiece to your own holiday decorating.

Set up the base for your centerpiece:

Use a large dish of any kind that will hold a water source for your greenery and for flowers should you choose to use them.

I picked up this oval tray from Dollar Tree which easily held two full blocks of floral foam.

Use some waterproof floral tape. This is different from floral stem tape.

For an arrangement of this size, use two strips of the floral tape to secure your floral foam in place.

Making an evergreen centerpiece:

Choose Christmas greenery of your liking. For this arrangement I selected cedar boughs and white pine tips. Begin to shape out your centerpiece with the greenery at the ends of your arrangement.

You can cut the pieces with utility scissors or small wire cutters into the size pieces you want to add to your arrangement.

For a very traditional centerpiece, consider adding a glass chimney. As long as you aren’t going to be moving the arrangement around a lot, you can just set the chimney onto the floral foam. You don’t need to attach it in any way.

I added a tall white pillar candle to mine, but a red one might me more your style.

Continue to add the cedar all around the base of your arrangement until the container you have used is hidden. You can see how your arrangement is taking shape.

Use small pieces of cedar and white pine to hide the base of the glass chimney. Simply place those pieces upright all around the glass.

You can then fill in the space between the base and the chimney with more white pine and cedar until the floral foam is completely covered.

How to add pinecones to an evergreen arrangement:

Take a piece of heavy weight floral wire. I used 21 weight, but you could also use 18 weight. The lower the number, the heavier the wire.

Feed the wire through the top few rows of scales on the pinecone.

Pull the ends of the wire around so that you have a “U” shape as shown below.

Twist the ends of the wire together up near the pinecone to make a wire you can push into the floral foam.

I added six pinecones to my arrangement, but you can add as many as you would like. Simply stick the twisted wires into the floral foam and bend the pinecone until you are happy with how the pinecones look in your arrangement.

Add flowers to your centerpiece:

Select the flowers you would like to add to your centerpiece. I used white alstroemeria and red carnations. Cut the stems the length you will need to secure them in the floral foam. Stiff stemmed florals like carnations and roses are perfect for this project. You might have some difficulty with softer stemmed florals like ranunculus.

This is where you can express your own design style. You might want to stop with just white blooms!

I wanted to add red carnations to my arrangement. Red carnations are a favorite of mine this time of year!

Here is an overhead shot to give you an idea of how the arrangement may look. I used one bunch of alstroemeria and 11 red carnations (yes, one in the package was broken)!

Display your centerpiece on your table, add fresh water daily, and replace the blooms when they fade and you will have a lovely arrangement through the holidays!

How to make ribbon loops and tails to your arrangement:

Ribbon loops and tails are a great way to add style to your holiday centerpiece. You will need some wood wired sticks like these shown below to add these accents to your arrangements.

Cut a piece of the ribbon you want to use. I used a variety of lengths in my centerpiece, depending upon where I was putting them. I had some from 5 to 9 inches.

To cut a pretty swallow tail end to your tails, fold the end of your ribbon in half.

Cut the ribbon at an angle as shown below.

Unfold the ribbon and you have a pretty end to your tail!

Squeeze the uncut end of your ribbon into a tight little bunch.

Lay the wood wired stick next to your little bunched up ribbon and wrap the wire around the ribbon very tightly. Make sure you also wrap the wire around the stick at least twice below where it is wrapped around the ribbon. If you don’t do this, the ribbon can potentially come off of the stick.

Stick the tails into your arrangement wherever you would like.

Here is the same arrangement with red velvet loops and tails in place of the red carnations. Loops are made the same way as the tails, just fold over a length of ribbon and squeeze both ends of it tightly so it can be attached to a wood wired stick.

Easy ways to change up the look of your centerpiece:

It is so easy to change up your centerpiece to your decor style. Leave the flowers out and just use pinecones and red velvet ribbon loops and tails for an elegant look!

If you prefer some glitz, add silver picks like these silver holly leaves.

To add ornaments to your arrangement, use the same floral wire that you would use for pinecones.

Perhaps you don’t want a candle! Without the chimney and candle, you can add an elegant reindeer, gold ornaments and gold snowflakes along with some beautiful gold pinecones.

However you choose to style your evergreen centerpiece, I hope you make yourself a beautiful arrangement you can enjoy this holiday season!