As an alternative to real flowers and silk flowers, you might have heard of sola wood flowers, and I agree that they are an exceptional and beautiful choice for your wedding! But precisely what are they?
These wood flowers have been the trendsetters in floral design and wedding planning. Without burning a hole in your pocket, these cheap and stylish wood flowers look elegant and can enhance any case.
The Sola Wood flowers are very durable, biodegradable, environmentally friendly, and inexpensive. Sola wood flowers are made from one of 3 plants: a woody shrub is known commonly as yuca or cassava (Manihotesculenta), a sola or shola plant (Aeschynomeneaspera), or balsa wood (Ochromapyramidale).
The lightweight, corky inside of these plants is shaped to resemble real flowers with the bark removed. Sola wooden flowers are biodegradable artificial flowers handmade from cassava, sola, or balsa wood plants with soft cream-colored mats. The thin sheets are crafted into both life-like and abstract flowers of all shapes and sizes by artisans. They last with proper care and storage forever.
Each sola wood flower is made by hand, meaning that no two flowers are exactly alike and that each one will have slight "imperfections" just like a real flower.
Making sola wood flowers varies from craftsman to craftsman and business to business. Still, it appears to be very similar in general. All the sola wood flowers I've seen so far are crafted by artisans BY HAND! No servers. And how cool is it? This implies that each individual flower is subtly different and memorable... just like real flowers!
Each of the plants mentioned above is stripped of its bark or skin (yuca, sola, or balsa), and then the inner white cork-like core is cut into thin sheets. For a different, natural multi-colored look, the barks, or sections of it, are held on the flowers in certain cases.
The white sheets are soaked and then gathered and molded into any number of extremely realistic looking flowers by hand to soften them up.
When you are dealing with Sola Wood Flowers, the style possibilities are endless. From daisies to dahlias, you will find anything. To give more life to the petals, you can also reshape your flowers. If the flowers look flat or get a little smooshed, shaping is beneficial.
Dunk the flower a few times in a bowl of room temperature water to reshape it. Ensure that the flower is fully immersed. Shake off any excess water, then gently fan out the petals using your fingertips. Set the flower aside to dry for around 24 hours before painting until you have the form you're looking for.
You can reshape the flowers when dyeing them to save time because the wood from the dyeing process would be soft and pliable.
To dye Sola Wood Flowers, acrylic/craft paint is most commonly used because it is readily available, inexpensive, and comes in a rainbow of colors. Latex paint, spray paint, watercolor, and fabric dye can be used as well. The best way to dye wooden flowers is to use Sola Softener to prepare a mix of acrylic paint, then dip the flowers into the mixture.
The solution to this issue is a Sola softener. Sola softener is a Glycerin solution that is easy to use and grows harm-resistant sola wood flowers. Even after death, this softener keeps Sola flowers soft and covered. Vegetable glycerin is highly effective in treating the fragility of sola wood only after it has been dyed. The 1:3, 1:5, and 1:10 ratios are typically used to combine glycerin and paints to produce a combination that softens the flowers to make them more flexible and squishy.
Add a small dab of hot glue to the back of the flower. Push your stem (wire or bamboo) through the glue and into the flower. You will want to insert the stem about 1/4 inch into the flower. Let the glue dry, and check to make sure the flower is secure on the stem. If it seems a bit lose, feel free to add a bit more glue where the flower meets the stem.
You will note a flat back for some of the flowers, and some do not. Many flowers have a bit of a "tail" just from the way the flower is produced. A bird will be an example of a flower having a tail. No worries, just clip off the back a little bit of the excess sola wood, then insert your stem. Just be careful not to get too near to the flower's foundation, or it might unravel and become unusable.
Sola wood flowers are a creamy ivory color, of course. And others, depending on the form (or "cut") of flowers you order, as part of their design, will have some bits of barks left on them (these are very interesting looking!). They even have tiny thin, barely visible lines that run through them that look like the veins on natural flower petals that you can find.
The best part of this natural material is that it is timeless! Sola Wood Flowers are better than real flowers and last as long as you take care of them, which simply ensure that you don't put them through a wood shredder.
You don't lose authenticity or elegance if you use Sola Wood Flowers for your crafting projects and bouquets. The arrangements of wood flowers look so much like the real thing that no one believes otherwise. Plus, fragrance oil can be added to the petals so that the flowers smell as pretty as they look.
There is a risk that your flowers will get moldy if they are placed in an airtight container or in the humid air. You don't want to go and open a box of sola wood flowers stored there to find them covered in fuzzy mold. That isn't going to be fun. So keep them in a dry spot, and make sure it has some ventilation if you're keeping them in a crate. And always, after dyeing them, let them dry absolutely.
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