How to make a decorative Christmas cloche as an impressive centrepiece for a party table

With the limitations and scarcity of flowers at this time in the year, I notice that a deeper kind of seeing kicks in. To keep making and creating arrangements we rely on more than the obvious showy blooms of the other more fruitful seasons. I love shy winter for choosing ingredients that would usually be overlooked or overshadowed by the more dominant, obvious flowers. Subtle hues in blues and greys of spruce, juniper and cedar. Mosses and pine cones, rose hips, crab apples and lingustrum berries all bring punches of colour, and then there’s the tenacious little flowers that grow among the harshest conditions, like hellebores and snowdrops. 

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Making a Christmas floral cloche

Bell jar beauty

This simple yet magical arrangement requires minimal ingredients to create, showcasing tiny stems or branches, mosses, leaves and other found items. By arranging and placing under glass, they become magnified and framed, creating a fairytale-like centrepiece. 

You will need

• Glass cloche with base
• 3 stems of ranunculus 
• 3 stems of anemone
• 2 hellebores
• 1 Japanese quince branch in blossom 
• 3 stems of ligustrum berries 
• 1 crab apple branch with berries 
• Small dish 
• Kenzan (a flower frog) 
• Florists’ waterproof putty/tack

How to make

1. Secure a flower frog into the bottom of your dish with a little florists’ putty to ensure it stays in place.
2. Keep the glass dome next to your arrangement as you create, so that you can regularly check that the height and width of the design doesn’t exceed the size of the dome. 
3. Place the tallest stem first. Press this firmly into the flower frog, keeping check of dimensions of the dome.
4. Next add a focal bloom, such as the red ranuculus, or you could use a cluster of berries, right at the lowest point, sitting flush or just over the edge of the dish.
5. Now you have the highest and lowest points, you can stagger your ingredients between the two. In this design, there are no rights or wrongs for placement. Using fewer flowers allows you to really contemplate each stem; its length, shape and fullness can help determine where in the arrangement you place it. 
6. Once you are happy with the shape and coverage, place the dish on the base of the cloche. 
7. Carefully place the glass dome over the design, moving it from side to side very slightly in a shimmy fashion to make sure that none of your stems get bent or trapped.

Looking for more Christmas decoration ideas? Head to our Christmas hub for lots more and subscribe to Gardens Illustrated for gardening inspiration throughout the year. 

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