How to Make Flower Lights Out of Recycled Plastic
by Heather
4 Materials
$30
4 Hours
Advanced
I love to recycle things into art projects! And recycling plastic drinking bottles couldn’t be more fun. You’ll feel good about helping the earth while creating something wonderfully creative. With this tutorial you’ll learn how to make beautiful, colorful flowers that are strung on a string of lights. It adds glowing color to wherever you hang them. These would be super pretty in your garden or for an evening barbecue.
Beautiful, aren’t they? I like to use them to add a little interest and color to my outdoor spaces.
Start by cutting the bottoms off your plastic bottles. I cut my plastic bottles into this particular flower shape by following along the curves of each side.
Next, spray paint them with bright colors. You can go for spring hues like I chose, or you can even try to mix it up with metallics. During fall or Christmas, coordinating colors would make an awesome addition to your holiday decor.
Don’t forget to add leaves! I cut oval shapes out of the sides of the water bottles for my leaves.
To make the shapes more organic looking, (so that they don't look like cut up water bottles), melt the plastic with a heat gun to get amazing contours.
You also need to melt the flowers a bit with the heat gun to make them look more realistic as well. But you don't need to heat them for long. They melt quickly.
Lastly, drill a hole in the center using a Dremel tool or drill.
Glue in the lights with hot glue and you're ready to hang them up!
And ta da! Look at how beautiful they look outside!
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2 of 45 comments
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So sorry to hear what you've been through with the fire. I'm glad it didn't dampen your creativity! I think these are wonderful. I don't drink soda, but I have friends who do, so I'm asking for empties!
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An eye for the inventive!! As another said: "great re-purposing", (and... 'so cute-to boot') ! Imagining all-white for a Daisy or Magnolia themed addition, intertwined with Ivy, perhaps?
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Really nice. Do you have pictures of using the heat gun? Do you turn them inside out? What is the picture of the leaf in the white bowl? Do you think you could use spray paint on them?
great job !!!👍😄
What kind of paint do you use?