Making Our Large Wire Trees

                                Making Our Large Wire Trees

There are so many very good tutorials on YouTube that might be helpful. One I found showed how to make your gum trees foliage a lot thinner and his did look like gum trees. I tried to follow him but ended up with much thicker trees so I have named ours Oak trees which we love anyway. Thank God the people that live in Glennanburg love whatever improvements we make and add to their little valley.

You will need the following items to make your wire trees:

-       Wire, I just used a gauge that I found I could bend and twist easily because there is a lot of bending and twisting.

-       Pliers, you may find you may need this to help twist your wire, but on the internet some men have made some tools to help make this easier. I chose to just use the pliers and my figure.

-       Some leather gloves to protect your hands from getting cuts all over them from the twisting of the wire.

-       Floristry Tape, I chose to use dark green only because I had some, but I have brought dark brown for my next lot for down in the village.

-       Rope, for the twigs that stick to your branches.

-       Grater from the cheap $2 shop.

-       Containers for you grated rope.

-       

large mixing bowl or container for dipping the trees in to glue the foliage.

-       A spray booth would be helpful for this job, it will help to contain the spraying of you hair spray and paints.

-       Green flocking, that I have shown how to make back in December 11^th 2020 “Making The Flocking For The Train Layout”.

-       White paint mixed with PVA glue 50/50 mix to seal you work and make it a little stronger and like plastic.

-       A cheap paint brush for painting on the PVA sealer.

-       Burnt Umber Paint, but some trees especially gum trees could be paint in a fawn or a grey.

-       A cheap paint brush to paint your burnt umber paint on the trunks and branches of your trees.

-       Vintage white paint to dry bush highlights on the trunks of the trees.

-       Green Flocking and olive green flocking.

-       Cheap Hair Spray.

-       Baking paper to leave the trees to dry on.

                                                  

You start by cutting your strips of wire I cut mine around 20cm each. Then you bundle up around 10 of them together and fold them in half and start twisting them together for about 2cm. Then you leave out two to three wires and then twist a little more and leave out another three wires and continue this until you have three wires left for the top of the tree branches.

This is what you should end up with, something like this. But but careful to not make them all the same.

Once you have finished twisting and making all of the branches you then need to cut the loops of wire at the bottom of the tree with a good pair of pliers. This will form the roots of the tree and will help it to stand up. 

Now start wrapping the floristry tape around the trunks and branches, you will need to up and down the tree until you have a good thick covering and you feel happy with the thickness of them.

This is what you should end up with.

Now it is time to paint the trees with the 50/50 mix of PVA and white paint to seal your trees, you may have to let them dry and recoat them until you are happy with the thickness.

Once the trees have completely dried it is time to spay them in the colour of the tree you are making. I hand painted each one of these but you could spray paint them to save time. And then let them dry for 24 hours. 

Once they are dry they will need to be dry brushed with some vintage white to high light the bark and then you could add some light green for moss. 

Once the trees are dry again spray the branches with the hair spray and dip into the grated rope and them let dry.

Once they are dry spray them with the hair spray once again and dip them in the green flocking.

Once they are dry enough spray them again with the hair spray and sprinkle some olive green flocking over the top of them to give a slight burnt effect.

 Set aside to dry for at least 24 hours. 

Once they are dry you can cut the flocking to separate the the branches and define them but be careful. 

Now the trees are ready for planting in your train layout, war diorama, or your dolls house garden.

I do hope you found this helpful and if you have any questions please feel free to leave you questions and comments in the space provided below.