Everlasting Flowers: Essential Tips for Drying Your Flowers

Now that fall is approaching and our season is winding down for the year, I thought it would be an excellent time to teach you all about drying your flowers to make them everlasting! 

I’m tellin’ ya–dried flowers are making a comeback, people! 

I’ve narrowed it down to the most simple steps to ensure your success:

1. Choose your flowers for drying wisely

2. Hang them upside down OR

3. Press them between parchment paper to frame them 

I’ll explain each of these steps just a little more for ya. 

1. Choose your flowers for drying wisely 

Not all flowers dry well. Some will dry, but lose all their petals. And some will dry, but the color completely diminishes and makes it pointless. Specific ones that come to mind are cosmos and snapdragons. I just wouldn’t bother! 

Here are my top three favorites to dry because they LITERALLY LOOK THE EXACT SAME once you dry them! It’s like magic!

1. Strawflower

2. Statice

3. Gomphrena 

Pictured here is gomphrena. The button-like blooms are so cute!

Some others to note: 

1. Marigolds

2. Hydrangeas

3. Celosia

4. Larkspur 

These are all great flowers. The first three hold their shape and color perfectly, it’s like they were meant to be dried. The other four are great–they hold their color and look especially cool in wreaths. They just don’t hold their shape quite as well, but I have all of these scattered throughout my house. 

2. Hang your flowers upside down. 

There are three key components to this one–I wouldn’t just hang them upside down anywhere. You want your hanging place to be 

-cool

-dry

-dark 

And this will ensure that your flowers hold their color and don’t crackle up. 

3. Press your flowers between parchment paper. 

This is a great option if you want to FRAME your flowers! 

I like to press my flowers in between pages in books—but not touching the pages directly. Hence, the parchment paper or wax paper. 

Stick your flowers between the pages of a heavy book, then close it, and then weigh the book down with another heavy object. 

The trick with this method is you need to use flowers that have NOT started drying or dying on their own. They need to be fresh, otherwise they will just crumple between your pages. 

Pictured here is larkpur that was pressed a few months ago—and the coloring is still SO vibrant and perfect!

CONCLUSION: 

Give your flowers at least 3 weeks (either hanging or pressed) before handling. Once those 3 weeks are up, you can arrange them in a dry vase, or into a fall wreath (yay!) or place them in a frame. 

Your flowers will keep as long as they are kept out of extreme temperatures, kept indoors, and out of direct sunlight. (i.e. wreaths left on your front door won’t last long, though they’re beautiful!) 

If you have any questions or comments, let me know!