As someone in the room when we create how-to projects, I always feel a responsibility to tell you when you MUST DO A PROJECT NOW, since sometimes the camera doesn’t do a thing justice (projects you must do now: ombre honeycomb balls, carnation backdrop, spray panted pumpkins). Blessedly, the camera makes the glitter feather centerpiece look super super awesome, but it still doesn’t make it look AS awesome as it looks in person. You should do this project yesterday. Tweak it to fit your wedding style as needed, but do it yesterday.
Other pluses: this project costs somewhere in the realm of stupid cheap, is crazy easy, can be made in advance, can be broken down to transport to your venue, and can be modified a million ways to fit your decorations. (I’ve listed a ton of modification ideas below.)
Your materials are:
Lemmie break this down for you.
- A 4X4 piece of lumber (actually ours was a 3.5X3.5, but that sounds less catchy), which you’ll have home depot cut down for you. We made these centerpieces 16 inches long, which means a 12 foot piece of lumber would give you nine centerpieces. (Maths!) (Approximate Cost for 9 centerpieces: $20)
- Feathers, about 20 per centerpiece. We used guinea feathers from Michaels which I can’t source online but should be easy to find (or maybe you know a chicken), but you can use hot pink feathers or fluffy feathers or whatever strikes your fancy. (Approximate Cost for 9 centerpieces: $100)
- Glitter (Approximate Cost for 9 centerpieces: $14)
- Spray adhesive (Approximate Cost for 9 centerpieces: $11)
Which brings the grand total of your nine high impact centerpieces (assuming you can borrow a drill to make them with) to $145. That, my friends, is going to be a hard price to beat.
In terms of number of centerpieces, if you’re using long tables, you might want to do two per table—or better yet, one huge long centerpiece per table. (How awesome would that look? So. Awesome.) You can get away with enormous on this one, and still stay sane, because the lumber can be transported separately from the feathers. For round tables, one of these suckers will probably suffice.
Lets walk through how you make these suckers (potential modifications to follow):
Step Minus One: Get your lumber pre-cut at Home Depot. It’s step minus one, because you’re getting someone else to do your work for you. (#LazyGirlCrafts FTW.)
Step One: Cover up the base of your feathers with paper, and apply spray adhesive on the tips. Then, flip it and reverse it.
Step Two: Sprinkle glitter (we used three colors: hot pink, light pink, and gold) on both sides of your feather tips, shake off, and let dry.
Step Three: Drill holes in the top of your 4X4(ish) piece of lumber.
Step Four: Put feathers in said holes.
And that, my friends, is it. You can prep the feathers in advance, carefully bag them up, and assemble the centerpieces on site. And did I mention they look amazing in person? THEY LOOK AMAZING YOU SHOULD MAKE THEM NOW.
Possible Modifications
The best part of this particular project are that there are about a billion modifications you can do to make it fit into your particular style. Let’s discuss a few of my favorites.
Paint the base: If you want a less boho look, you can paint the bases to make it a bit more polished (or a lot more polished—I’m looking at you, metallic paint). I highly recommend spray paint for a project like this, because, easy.
Paint the ends (only): This is for sure my favorite modification idea. Here, you just paint the ends of the 4X4. I’d go for a bright color (say, hot pink), a metallic, or cover it in glitter like a crazy person.
Change the size of the lumber: As previously discussed, it would be easy and practical to make these centerpieces tremendously long, since the lumber and feathers can be transported separately. In fact, if you want to make them super duper long, you could cut the lumber into transportable segments, and duck tape or super glue them together on site. You can also use a much flatter board for a totally different look (much like this).
Use a different kind of feathers: This one is pretty obvious, but changing the feathers is going to really change the look of the project. Also, let’s talk about using the word “feathers” loosely, since craft stores carry a lot of bright colored fake feather fluff that is madness.
Dip Dye the Feathers: We glittered these feathers up, but white feathers dip-dyed would be magical (and might look something like this). Slightly harder prep, but magical.
Don’t Use Feathers: There are about a million items you could use here instead of feathers (crowd sourcing ideas in the comments) but my initial suggestions include silk flowers (um, covered in glitter?), candles (if your venue doesn’t have an open flame policy), or small balloons a-la-water-ballons tied to sticks (covered in glitter?).
In short: glitter, it’s what’s for dinner. (But not actually for dinner, because this project blessedly doesn’t shed.) Now go listen to this and get your craft on.
