This Easy Hack Keeps Your Flower Bouquets Standing Straight In The Vase

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Whether they're clipped from your garden or gifted from a friend, there's nothing quite like the colors and scents of a bouquet of fresh flowers. There are many reasons why you should be keeping fresh flowers in your home year-round, but getting them to stay upright in a vase can be a challenge. If the thought of trying to persuade your blooms to stay where you put them steals a bit of your joy, this hack offers hope. A few strips of carefully placed Scotch tape are all you need to make the bouquet you envision become a reality.

This hack works best on open-neck vases such as the CYS Excel Large Cylinder Clear Glass Vase. Start by filling the vase to approximately ¾ full, then dry the inside and outside of the top of the vase thoroughly. Use Scotch tape or floral tape — both work well — to create a criss-cross grid across the opening of the vase. The number of strips you use will vary depending on the size of the vase opening. 

With your grid in place, work on the flowers. Trim the bottom of the stems at an angle for maximum water absorption. If your cut flowers are too short, give them a boost by placing each stem into a plastic straw. Working from the center, place a few flowers in each square. The tape acts as an invisible support that stops the flowers from flopping. Top up the water with a long, narrow-spouted watering can.

If you love collecting glassware, you'll know that not all vases are created equal. They come in all shapes and sizes, and that means working with different types of openings. Cylinder shapes, along with square or rectangular vases, are all good candidates for taped grid arrangements, as they all have large openings. Fishbowl vases are delightfully extravagant and work best with bunches of flowers with short stems. Taller stemmed flowers will look unbalanced and are likely to topple over or fall right out of the bowl, so be sure to chop them down. These round beauties are well-suited to a taped grid, especially those with wide openings.

Bottle neck vases don't have enough open space for a tape grid to be useful. The trick to creating an arrangement in one of these is to hold your plant stems together firmly and give them a quick twist before placing them into the vase. This puts each stem and flower into a diagonal position, creating a stable arrangement. The result is simple, yet elevated and much more thoughtful than popping them into a vase and hoping for the best. 

You may be wondering how often you should be changing the water in your vase of cut flowers and whether or not you can do it with a grid in place. Pouring out the old water shouldn't affect the tape, especially if you aim to avoid moisture getting near where the tape sticks to the vase, and pour slowly.