DIY: Natural Christmas Wreaths

Let winter’s harvest inspire your Christmas decorations this year, as Graham Kechnie and Andraya Frith, owners of an old stone house in Hastings County, Ontario, do. “I like a natural look, and nothing I could add is better than the view,” says Andraya. Learn how she crafted this homemade wreath out of berries, pinecones and evergreen boughs below, and see inside the couple’s character-filled country house in our November 2017 issue, on newsstands from October 9.

Materials:

You’ll need grapevine, fresh evergreen boughs, pinecones, berries (Andraya used offcuts from Christmas trees and trees and berries on the property, and ends from store-bought garlands used elsewhere in her decorating), cedar garland, thin-gauge metal wire, pruning sheers, wire cutters, jute or natural twine, eye hooks.

Instructions:

1. Gather a bundle of grapevine and form into a circle of the desired size. The vine will stick to itself as you continue to work with it and overlap its ends, but if needed, use the metal wire to hold the ends together. Keep adding grapevine to the circle form until wreath is the desired thickness. 

2. Lay wreath on flat surface. Take cedar garland and lay on top of entire grapevine wreath, using metal wire to hold in place every 12”.

3. Using the metal wire and wire butters, affix small bundles of greenery boughs in an overlapping pattern around the circumference of the wreath.

4. Add berries and pinecones to your wreath as desired. 

5. Using twine and eye hooks screwed into a window frame, hang the wreath.