Making things with natural materials

Nature provides an endless source of beautiful things which, with a little skill and some artistic flair, can be made into personal and unusual decorations for the home; from flower arrangements with dried leaves and flowers to pictures, panels, amusing figures and toys.

Fir cones, ears of corn, beech nuts, leaves and flowers, beans, seeds and fruit cost nothing and are fun to collect. The hedgerows, woods and country lanes all offer their seasonal harvest of fruit, flowers and seeds.

Before you set out to collect your material make sure you are properly equipped. Take a basket (tightly-woven so that small things won't fall through the gaps) or a couple of plastic bags, a pair of sharp secateurs and a sharp knife, and a pair of gardening gloves to save your hands from thorns and the sting of nettles.

On these pages are our suggestions for things to make. You can copy them, or use them as inspiration for working out your own ideas.

Flower picture
In Victorian days, dried and pressed flowers were very popular — family portraits and early photographs would be surrounded by arrangements of dried flowers. Home-made anthologies of poems were embellished with pressed violets and pansies, and well-thumbed novels often harbored a single rose, its faded petals evoking some long-dead romance.

Today dried flowers are back in vogue; not only do they make charming arrangements, but they can be used to make three-dimensional pictures. For the one in our photograph we used everlasting flowers, seed heads, and elm leaves which have weathered to a gauze-like condition.

Freshly-picked poppy heads, everlasting flowers and thistle heads are easy to dry, if you hang them in loose bunches head down in a warm, dry atmosphere.

For the background of your picture use brightly colored thick paper, or a piece of thin fabric. We used wood shavings glued together and painted red to make the basket, but you could simply use a piece of fabric with a textured finish in a strong color which will stand out against the background. Next, cut your dried flowers into different lengths, and starting from the centre of the basket glue them into position with all-purpose glue. Finally, push the elm leaves in between the flowers at an angle and press them down. Glue two pieces of braid or ribbon on to the basket — one at the top to hide the flower stems, the other along the middle.

Flower panel
Melting resin forms the background for this very attractive and unusual flower panel. The small bouquets of dried flowers are chosen so that each panel is quite different and individual. Melting resin is obtainable from most good craft shops and comes with full instructions. It comes in clear form, or in colors. Use the clear variety so that your bouquets can be clearly seen.

Melt one layer of resin to form a panel thick enough to press the flowers on, so that they don't protrude anywhere. Press the bouquets in while the wax is hot and pour more resin on the top.

Finally pierce two holes with a hot knitting needle near the top edge and you can hang your picture on strong nylon thread. Hang it on the wall or, more effectively, where the light shines through it.

Candle holders
Attractive candle holders can be made simply and quickly by gluing circles of dried flower heads, seeds, beans or acorns on to a base of stiff cardboard. Cut your round base a little smaller than the finished size of the holder, so that it will not show. Then using chicken wire with a small mesh, bend it into a circle, leaving room for whichever size of candle you want to use in the centre. Push your dried material into the holes until all the wire mesh is hidden. Glue the arrangement on to the cardboard base and push the candle through the middle. The holders look charming on a dining table and have the practical bonus of catching the drips of candle grease.

A weather dragon
Fir cones provide a rudimentary way of forecasting the weather. In dry weather they open up, but when the atmosphere is moist they close up tightly. To amuse the children you can make a "weather dragon" from a fir cone, a cork, a few match-sticks and paper and buttons.

Choose a fine healthy cone, make a head from a cork by pushing in two small buttons at either side as eyes (the black and white ones which we used look very effective, or you could use small black buttons and paint white circles to put them on). We made a "jaw" for our dragon from white paper, cut with sharp scissors, to form the jagged teeth. The tongue can be made from a piece of stiff red card, or a match painted red. The head is connected to the body with a matchstick, and matchsticks form the monster's legs. Stand it on the window-sill in a plant trough (we used a nicely-shaped piece of bark picked up in the woods and lined with moss which looks like the creature's natural habitat) but keep it sheltered from direct rain and watch the scales open and close as the weather changes.

A cockerel made of leaves
This handsome fellow is made of copper beech leaves topped with transparent elm leaves and decorated with dried peas and beans and dried poppy heads. Because the leaves are subtly colored you will need a strong clear color as a background. We used burnt orange, in a stiff card, but turquoise, emerald green or even a deep gold would provide equally striking backgrounds.

First draw the outline of your bird in pencil on the card. Keep the shape as simple as possible, as you have to fill it in with leaves in different sizes. Then, using wood glue, glue the leaves in overlapping layers to look like feathers. One drop of glue will do for each leaf, and treat them very gently or they will tear. It's best to start from the tip of the tail and work backward toward the head, overlapping each layer, so you end with a neat layer round the neck rather like a ruff.

Now use the transparent elm leaves. These can be found under elm trees in woods where last year's leaves have not been cleared. They will have weathered to a transparent state; choose ones which are still whole and treat them very gently, they are extremely fragile.

Use the elm leaves to make the wing and add a few to the tail. Stick a few dried poppy heads gently under the leaves over the wing and then make a head and beak from light and dark beans, The cockerel's crest and neck is made from dried peas, and so are the tops of the legs, while the bottoms of the legs and feet are made from fine twigs.

When the picture is finished put it under glass, because the materials are so delicate that it will deteriorate unless protected from dust and air, and all your hard work will be wasted.

Animal, vegetable or mineral?
You can make any number of little creatures, from a fish to a dragonfly, using conifers, catkins and grasses, ripe ears of corn, corn cobs, and thistles to name just a few things readily available. Here are some suggestions to get you started.

A sunflower carp
He makes a handsome mobile and is easy to put together. The body is a sunflower head, the mouth a piece of thin bark, the fins are beech leaves, the eye a piece of paper with the pupil painted on; we added the small sprig of dried grass for decoration. You can use glue, staples or pins to put the whole thing together, or a combination of the three.

Dragonfly on the cob
Our handsome dragonfly is largely corn on the cob, which makes the body. Well-dried elm leaves make the transparent wings — large ones for the back, smaller ones for the front, delicately glued to match-sticks sharpened at one end to push into the cob. We used florist's wire for the legs, bent so that they support the dragonfly, with small beans for the feet. The head is a dried thistle linked to the body with a match-stick. If you can't find the elm leaves already dried you can dry them yourself between the leaves of a book. When they have turned brown and are really dry you will be able to brush the thin brown scales off with a soft brush; you will be left with the fine transparent skeleton.

The fir-fly
A sprig from a fir tree makes the fly's rather untidy body. Elm leaves again are used for the wings, lightly glued on, and a beechnut makes the head. The eyes can be painted on with a fine brush, or if you have two very small black buttons you can glue those on.

The thistle star
Simplicity itself to make; use the paler side of the thistle head as the face, push in two pin heads as eyes (you can buy pins with different colored heads from most good haberdashery counters), and the red mouth can be a piece of scarlet paper or a red berry.

The pine saw-fly
This is made from a long pine cone, cut off leaving enough stalk to look like a small beak. Fir needles pushed in between the scales of the cone and glued on give the fly a bristling look. The more needles you use, the more ferocious your fly will look. The legs are white beans, glued on, and the eye is painted on white paper.

Birds' feathers make very good material for the amateur artist. You can find them in the woods, in your own garden, or even along the beach. You can use feathers just as you use leaves, and they will be hardier and more resistant to time and the atmosphere. They combine well with flowers to make collages.