How to make roses out of ribbon

Last year I came up with a way to make roses for my Christmas gift wrap using velvet and foil ribbon.

To make the Gantt velvet rose you will need:

1. Scissors
2. Foil backed velvet ribbon
3. Florist wire
4. Needle
5. Button Thread
6. Frog tape  (green masking tape.

I hope this video will help.   I will supplement it with written instructions.

1. Cut an 18" piece of foil backed velvet ribbon
2. Cut a 24" piece of florist wire, fold it double.   Leave a circle of wire at the fold about the size of a quarter.   Twist the wire together
3. Start at one end of the ribbon and coil it tightly with the foil side in.  (4 to 6 inches of ribbon.
4. Now start to turn over the top edge of the ribbon so that the foil side starts to show.
5. Lay the coil flat on the table and sew the bottom a couple times to hold it.
6. Working from the coil toward the other end and the foil side down,  put 2    1/4" pleats in the ribbon.   Sew through those with the button thread.
7. Lay the "quarter sized" end of the florist wire into the folds
8. Keeping the wire in place roll the ribbon tight to the opposite side of the coil.   Make two more roughly 1/4"  pleats.   Sew through both sets of pleats making sure to catch the florist wire.
9. Staggering your pleats so they are not directly on top of each other continue 2 pleats -roll-2 pleats-roll.  (as you near the end you can make your pleats progressively a little larger.  Of course you sew through each new set of pleats.  
10. At the end sew through the bottom until secure.
11. Fold the edge of the foil out more and more to the end.
12. With your scissors round off the end of the ribbon.
13. Wrap the base of the rose tight with the frog tape
14. Gradually wrap further and further down the wire to create the stem.

"Frog" tape is wrapped tightly around the base of the rose 3 or 4 times

Gradually continue wrapping down the florist wire to make the stem

Completed  rose

My next post will show how to incorporate the roses into Christmas gift wrap.
I hope you found this useful.   Let me know what you think.

It looks like I may be moving to a smaller studio sometime next year, so it is likely that everything will
be 1/2 off at the CHRISTMAS OPEN HOUSE   -DECEMBER 1 & 2.   Mark your calendar!