How To Make Paper Roses From Baking Cups

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Paper roses: They were made famous by a song of the same name, and were a substitute for real flowers in times when the ravages of winter made growing roses impossible. If any craft project has the potential to bring beauty and happiness into your space, it'd be this one. Although you can make them from any kind of paper you want, Instagram's @clarehooper made paper roses from baking cups by molding them against the rim of a wine glass.

It's a smart choice because the thin paper of the baking cups mimics the delicate texture of real roses, and the ridged paper makes this craft extra fun because it adds another textural element that's missing from real rose petals. Cupcake and muffin cups offer a second advantage in that they usually come in a variety of colors and sometimes with patterns, like Wilton's Polka Dot Cupcake Liners. Because of this, crafters have the option of using more than one color or pattern in the same flower. 

You'll also need a wine glass and clear craft glue, like the Bearly Art Store Glue, to form the petals. Or, if you prefer, you can DIY some homemade glue. All in all, this project is a fun way to repurpose leftover cupcake liners into décor if the foodie in you is all baked-out.

If you've ever tried to pull apart two coffee filters that were stubbornly stuck together, then you probably understand one of the first potential challenges you'll be faced with when you begin this craft project. Cupcake liners are just as inclined to cling to each other as coffee filters are. In light of that, make separating the liners the first order of business. Most of the time, these cups come in bunches. You'll use approximately one bunch for each rose. Consider how many roses you'd like to end up with and pull apart an equivalent number of bunches.

Flatten and fold them in half following the separation stage. You'll want to do this because it makes molding them around the rim of the wine glass that much easier. If you want to lessen the appearance of the ridges in the liners, now's the time to do it. As for the tell-tale curve that is associated with rose petals, this is made possible thanks to the help of the wine glass and some glue. The baking cups curve around the lip and the body of the glass, which forms the curved petals in the finished product. A straight glass won't have the same visual effect, so it's important to use a curved, almost bubble-like glass for this part.

Finally, because you'll glue the petals together while they're still on the glass, use an old glass you don't care much about for this part. If glue seeps through the baking cups, you won't be worried about ruining a good glass.

At this stage, you'll have a bunch of rose heads without any stems or leaves. This isn't to say that you can't decorate with the roses in this form. They'd be lovely if you placed about a dozen of them in a flat decorative bowl, for example. However, you don't need to do without stems and leaves if you don't want to. Inserting green sticks, such as the Royal Imports Store Green Wood Plant Stakes, into the bottoms of the roses creates a stem. You just need to put a dab of glue near the base of the flower and allow it to dry to keep the stem attached to the rose. If you'd like them to be more colorful, go with craft sticks in assorted hues instead of plain green ones, or paint some popsicle sticks.

When it comes to making the leaves, in a pinch you could cut some out of the cupcake or muffin cups. However, something like the Tenn Well Burlap Leaf Ribbon makes for a more sophisticated option. This kind of craft ribbon sports little fabric leaves that are interwoven into a string of burlap ribbon. If you wrap the string of leaves around the craft stick and glue down each end of it, it'll look like a twig from a rose bush. This is due to the optical illusion created by the brown color of the burlap juxtaposed against the green leaves. Finally, you can elegantly repurpose a tall candle jar to make a vase and give your bouquet décor a home.