So I think I’m going to try and create a crystal wedding tree for our escort table. I’ve seen it all over the place. In magazines and on TV. I always watch wedding shows for any design ideas and I really like this one. It’s pretty easy to make too, but it may be a little costly.
Now there are two kinds I can make. One is the one that we all see on the Sandals ads designed by Preston Bailey. The other has crystal strands hanging from it.
The tree branches themselves I would order from Nettleton Hollow. I would have to order 24-36″ Natural Manzanita Branches. I would order larger, but then they stick you with really high shipping charges. No thanks. I’d also have to order either the strands of crystals or the crystal balls. That’s where it gets pricey. Not sure how many balls or strands I would need. A 36″ strand of glass crystals is $9.95 and one 20mm glass ball is $1.47.
If the cost ends up being under $500 I might do it.
June 14, 2007 at 11:13 am
Hey Tara,
I was thinking about creating a wedding tree mysefl. I’m getting married on Oct, 20, 2007. Don’t know when your wedding date is, but if you find out how much it would cost to have the tree made, could you let me know and if it was hard to do.
And congratulations on your pending nuptials!!
Katherine
July 13, 2007 at 12:35 am
i made my tree for around $250. I bought my crystal at http://www.cristalier.com and i used tree branches from my neighbors yard (wind storm). we painted it white and silver and hung crystal strands and balls it was beautiful.
July 13, 2007 at 11:05 pm
Why buy a Manizita tree online when most
florist’s wholesalers has them. Ask your
local florist to sell them to you. I am a
Floral designer and My wholesaler (kennicott
Brothers) has them in 2 sizes large and
small. And you dont have to pay for shipping
Good Luck
August 14, 2007 at 1:53 am
http://www.shopwildthings.com
They sell acrylic beaded curtains. It is only $19.99 for a 35″ x 70″ curtain. They also have mirror curtains. This was an idea i found from a person on a martha stewart forum. I am going to go that route and take them apart. Much cheaper. They seem to have a lot of hype.
August 14, 2007 at 9:53 am
Nancy,
What kind of tree are you putting the beaded curtains on? Thanks for the great website
August 14, 2007 at 4:30 pm
I don’t even know what to call it. I am going into the woods and finding a twiggy tree (as i call it). My parents have one every christmas and put it in our front window with white lights on it. They have it anchored in cement. I guess i will do the same sort of thing. I am getting married in October and it shouldn’t be to hard to find one. I am about to order the curtain and i will see how heavy it is so i guess that will determine how thick the branches need to be.
August 21, 2007 at 7:41 am
do you need real crystal to get the sparkle and how do you light it up to get that effect. I found beaded curtains at http://www.shopwildthings.com will they work and if so which ones should I buy.
August 21, 2007 at 11:05 am
I think these would probably work.
http://www.shopwildthings.com/clgecu.html
I’m going to order them soon. I’m going to put this on the table with my escort cards which are actually candles, so the candlelight should reflect nicely off of the beads.
August 23, 2007 at 4:13 pm
I bought some curtains from shopwildthings and CHEAP GARBAGE!!!! I was extremely disappointed!!!! I even tried candles and that made them look worse!
I guess lesson learned, you get what you pay for. I want my tree to sparkle and the fake plastic crap there was dirty and did not give any sparkle. I’m going to buy the glass crystals!
August 30, 2007 at 12:21 am
The glass crystals really don’t sparkle much. I would go with Swarovski. They have some awesome lead free Swarovski crystal (no worries about health issues from handling lead crystals; it’s the law in CA that their supposed to tell customers about the health risks) They have lead free crystal that sparkles amazingly and at good prices on http://www.etherealdecor.com and better still, they have some unbelievable artificial manzanita trees in bronze, silver, gold, etc. and they come as big as 5.5′ feet tall! They are gorgeous. Check it out.
August 30, 2007 at 9:12 am
Awsome! Thanks Cynthia
August 31, 2007 at 12:57 am
I visited that ethreal place and OMG! $2500 for a tree NO THANKS. I was shocked at their prices. I would shop around more if I was you. There are plenty of places online to buy crystal trees or even rent a pre-made tree. Congrats on your wedding
September 1, 2007 at 3:15 pm
Yeah, I wasn’t talking about the already made tree with all that crystal on it, the $2500 tree is the one shown in the pictures on this site. There’s no way anyone is going to make that tree exactly like that for less than $2500 because it has over $2000 worth of Swarovski crystal on it! I meant, check out the artificial manzanitas trees and the do it yourself loose trees at http://www.etherealdecor.com and put less crystal on it or only buy the loose branches from them and put your own crystal and do a far cheaper tree. Only rich people or people with high budgets can do that tree exactly like you see it here with over 100 feet of Swarovski crystal. That tree is huge and over 6 feet tall! The prices on that big tree is high, but their prices on crystal is not high, the loose branches to do it yourself is reasonable and the artificial trees are as low as $100 or $200.
September 16, 2007 at 12:41 am
Check out the new silver and gold artificial manzanita branches at http://www.etherealdecor.com/projects.html it shows a nice centerpiece tree hung with a lot less crystal but this is much more do-able for centerpieces than the big tree with all the crystal. It’s easier too.
October 5, 2007 at 7:10 pm
I bought from shopwildthings and my beads were really really pretty. In fact I made a tree out of their beaded curtains, I cut them up and they didn’t look cheap at all. Everyone asked how I did it and where I got the beads. I used their candle trees too which were beautiful.
October 12, 2007 at 1:29 am
Alicia-which beaded curtain did you get from shopwildthings?
Thanks!
October 12, 2007 at 1:51 am
Also I am doing a 3′5″ tree on a 6″ stand with crystals (the lead free kind) and I would be willing to sell it once I am done for like 75% of what I end of paying so if anyone is interested I am getting married Dec 8th and can email you pictures and a price after that! Thanks!
October 16, 2007 at 12:15 pm
Which beads did you purchase for Shopwildthings?
October 17, 2007 at 3:03 am
I too am looking to do a crystal wedding tree. I just talked to someone today at http://didyousay.com which sells beaded curtains. The girl I talked to said if you use glass and want it to sparkle you need to have faceted beads and with something called AB coating. She said glass is great, but expensive. They recommended using acrylic instead of glass because it is much cheaper. (we have a relatively small wedding budget so bonus). I guess they have another company doing made-to-order curtains or beads because they emailed me these 3 links that appear to be from http://custombeadedcurtains.com.
http://custombeadedcurtains.com/projects/faceted.jpg
http://custombeadedcurtains.com/projects/faceted_close.jpg
http://custombeadedcurtains.com/projects/faceted_wide.jpg
These are supposedly acrylic beads that look like glass. She said these beads can be sold by the strand, as a completed beaded curtain, or as a custom application (I guess like the chandelier pictured)
Hope this helps!
October 23, 2007 at 12:08 pm
Hi, Check out http://stores.ebay.com/Tuesday-Springs, they have Manzanita Wedding Trees and Acrylic Crystals really cheap and I think they look great! $24.95 on a stand…Can’t beat that price…
November 10, 2007 at 6:20 pm
I have been researching all over the net for supplies to make crystal wedding trees. here is what I found so far.
1) Swarovski or lead crystals are pretty but WAY too expensive for multiple trees.
Order samples! If you are in doubt, invest a few dollars and order samples! Do you really want to wait until the last minute and find that you are unhappy with the plastic curtain you thought would look good. Just order a sample and be sure. I ordered samples from 4 companies (plastic, acrylic, glass and lead) I decided to use the glass. The acrylic was my second choice. But the plastic stunk – I mean actually smelled bad and the lead was beautiful but very costly. Most companies will allow yuo to return the samples too. I spent $60 in samples and probably saved hundreds know that I know what I will be using.
2) Plastic beads or curtains cut up are way too CHEAP. Use caution with this idea!
3) Glass crystals are the most middle ground choice.
4) You should be able to put together a tree with about 40 strands or less according to the designer I talked to at Cristalier.com. (they offer it for free and have good prices on strands – you might want to check them out even for just the free advice)
5) Shipping real trees is expensive. I was quoted almost $800 in shipping alone to have 6 large trees sent (5′ size) – No thanks!
6) Beware of sites that offer trees that you need to pay a down payment and wait for months to get your tree. I wouldn’t want to be left treeless in the last days before my wedding.
7) Most trees have the willow look (accoring to the designer I talked to) but this can be more expensive since the tree has to be really full. But you can also get a really pretty tree by swagging the strands across from branch to branch instead of draping them. That could save some serious money!
9) watch the videos on google. they quality isn’t all that great but you can get an idea of different looks. This helped me come to the choice that my largest center tree will be more “willow” style (I don’t know if that is an actual term, but that’s what the designer kept calling it) and the others around the hall will be more the swag style.
I hope this help someone out there, mostly I wish someone would have told me all this. It would have saved me alot of time and energy these last few months.
Best of luck out there and Congratulations to all the Brides!
Soon to MRS GINA!
November 14, 2007 at 9:19 am
Thank you so much for the info – from your recommendation, I am going to use the glass too
Thanks again
and Happy Wedding!!!
December 2, 2007 at 5:07 pm
This is by far the most useful forum that I’ve seen. Your advice is sooo useful. I’ve been searching the net too for a diy crystal tree and it’s tricky to save money on this thing. I need 12 of them so I’m really trying to save money. My wedding is March 15th. If you guys are looking for the hanging votives, http://www.candle4less.com has good deals. You’d have to buy the flowerpot and wrap some fish line or wire around it, but it’s do-able. Good luck with your weddings.
December 10, 2007 at 8:02 pm
I am doing a winter wedding in January, and the whole wedding is centered around my crystal tree. I found it on etherealdecor.com, but their products were very expensive and out of my budget. We tried to order branches from them, but after waiting for 2 months for them, they never came in so we canceled our order and the florist ordered some. I started looking around and found http://www.wholesalechandelier.com They have crystal rope by the yard for $6.00 (about $2 a foot!) I ordered 105 feet of crystals for about $210. That is the cheapest I found them, plus they shipped in about 4 days after we ordered them. We haven’t put the tree all together yet, but after the wedding I will try to post some pictures of it.
January 11, 2008 at 1:03 pm
thank you all for your wonderful ideas as i prepare for my daughter’s july wedding, we are hoping to use the jhanging floral/crystal theme for our tables instead of traditional flower arrangements. i learned from my florist that they can get manzanita branches practically free and i dont have to pay shipping. wholesalechandelier.com definitely has great prices on strings of crystals. we are removing them and hanging individual crystals on shimmery metallic thread from Michaels.
January 15, 2008 at 2:18 am
Cristalier charges $6 for their strands also but the quality is better, plus shipping is only $7. The also have the trees in stock and will ship them the same day you order.
be careful with wholesalechandelier…they are the same company listed in ripoffreport.com under gspn, spectrum and dozens of other names. http://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/0/145/RipOff0145976.htm
the keep changing their name but still same site…. just be careful
February 4, 2008 at 3:35 pm
hello all
my question is for Sarah…did you have any problems with wholesale chandelier? I think the prcies are very reasonable…but I’m always leary about internet purchases…especially if listed on ripoff report.
thanx