How I made my Large Faux Orchid Arrangement Centerpiece

I get super antsy to create something, anything with my hands. I’ve been on a “centerpiece” kick because I’ve got a few tables and areas of my new home where I need to place some decor or centerpieces that fit my vibe.

HomeGoods has been my second home lately, where I’m pretty much going once a week to find any items that resonate with me and the new home I’m slowly curating. I found these gorgeous real touch orchids and bought three sets of 3 – at about $20 per set.

But first, let’s start with all the materials I gathered and used to make this orchid arrangement centerpiece.

Materials

I’ve listed here everything I’ve gotten (mostly from Amazon), except for the brass planter vase. I actually found this solid brass vintage vase on Facebook marketplace! Facebook marketplace is one of my favorite places to find such good deals. I’m probably an addict at this point, lol!

Pink Orchid Flowers (Real touch) – HomeGoods (But similar ones can be bought here (shorter ones 31.5″) or here (taller ones 40″).
Vintage 1950’s Egidio Casagrande Hammered Brass Centerpiece Bowl (for those interested, I got this at a steal for $30 on Facebook marketplace and I found same ones selling on Antique sites for well over $500! Here’s one example)

Green Floral Foam Blocks – Set of 3 (Buy here)
Green Orchid Leaves Artificial Phalaenopsis Stems – I bought two different styles here. The ones on the left with varying green colors and the ones on the right as a single dark green color)
Green artificial Moss rocks – these are great! They come in 5 sizes. Purchase them here.

Natural white small pebble rocks – I got the 3lb bag! More than enough for this project. Purchase them here.
Green plant Stakes – these are made of metal. I ordered two different sizes here as I planned on having two rows of different heights for my orchids. The taller orchids I used these. For the shorter height orchids, I used these stakes to keep them upright.
Ready-to-use Rock glue spray – Great for keeping the white pebbles in place. Purchase it here.

Also not listed here is a caulk gun and a stick of Liquid Nails Caulk Glue. You can get these at your nearest Home Depot or Lowes. I’ve added the links to what I used here in case you’re interested.

In addition you’ll also want a cutting knife specifically made for cutting floral foam blocks. But really any knife will do.

Polishing up the Brass Planter

While I don’t have steps or pictures of me doing so, this step was relatively easy. My absolute GO-TO product for cleaning up tarnished brass is Bar Keepers Friend. I’ve used other products and techniques in the past, but this is hands down the best and easiest I’ve found. If you’re going to use this product I recommend using latex gloves as it will pill your hands (I learned my lesson!)

Just follow the directions on the can and you’ll get yourself a beautifully polished planter such as this one.

I absolutely love how big and roomy this brass planter is! I was super excited to get this project started!

Adding Floral Foam Blocks – Cutting to Size

I got my foam blocks and knife ready here, and because this is a pretty big planter, I used two layers of this block – one on top of the other – to place inside my vase. This way the stems are more snug and won’t fall sideways.

Cutting this particular foam is super easy, and I prefer to use this when a vase has a relatively easy opening to work with. I shaped it down and placed one on top of the other. In fact, you can literally push the foam into the vase, and in my case, the foam block cut itself against the thin brass edges.

Orchids & Stakes

The fun part, but also the hesitant part. With these types of foam blocks, you’re not given much grace, unfortunately. You can easily make dents and holes so you want to make sure that you’re happy with where you place it. Otherwise you’re left with a bunch of holes and space, making it difficult to place and keep your orchids upright. I put four long stems in the center, with their (long) stakes right beside them. Then on the outer perimeter, I placed five shorter orchid stems (I cut the stem a bit so they were shorter in height), and added stakes for them as well.

Overall I was pretty happy with the placement!

The little floral clips that came with the smaller stakes are super cute!

A Creative Touch

Ok, I got a little creative here.

I wanted to give this arrangement a bit of depth, like a topographic map. So I took some leftover floral blocks and cut some squares and placed them around the orchid stems. This is where my caulk gun and Liquid Nails Glue came into play.

In my head I had this vision and at this point I was really hoping my design in my head wasn’t going to be a huge mess up once I tried having it come to fruition.

Leaves, Moss & Stones

This is the super fun part!

I started by adding the Phalaenopsis Leaves around the orchid stems because what would orchids be without also having their leaves! Once I fluffed them and was happy with how I placed them, I worked on the next outer layer which were the green moss stones.

This part was a lot of trial and error – making sure that the moss stones covered all the foam blocks out of sight. I worked in small areas here by placing 2-5 rocks at a time in an arrangement I was happy with, then carefully dismantled it (remembering too where everything was), and then gluing them in place with my Liquid Nails glue.

When I was content with the moss rocks and their placements I started placing the white pebbles on the last outer layer and covered the rest of the outer area where the floral blocks were still exposed. This is the easiest part!

And it came together so well! I was very happy my design came to life better than I expected!

I waited until the next day to spray rock glue to the white pebbles as it was late and I wanted to do this part outside my patio.

The spray I got from Amazon comes preset. So you won’t need to add water to dilute it. Just add the spray top and mix well!

I took the centerpiece outside and I carefully sprayed the rocks with the sprayer. I kept the sprayer about 2 inches away from the pebbles and slowly sprayed them generously. The instructions say to rake the stones here so that you coat it fully all around the pebbles but these stones are so small and I was adding a good amount of liquid glue on top of the pebbles, that I didn’t bother. You can see the thick coating in my pictures below. I literally soaked these white pebbles!