How make your fake plants look real with simple tricks like adding real soil and stones and potting in a glass vase. These low maintenance fakes will have people guessing, without you having to worry about watering and fertilizing. And they're a great budget option for using as a centerpiece.
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When I was getting ready for our Valentine’s Day Fiesta, I knew I wanted to have a centre piece of cactus and succulents in glass vases. It’s simple, elegant, and on trend. So I started searching for the plants at a good price.
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I knew I wanted to have at least nine vases running down the centre of the long table, but most of the cactus and succulents I found were around $5 each, which equals way too much for a party.
But, I kept looking. When a new dollar store opened in my area I found some faux succulents for one dollar each -perfect!
They came in little plastic pots, so here’s how I transformed them into a something that looked real, and fooled my guests.
You could use these ideas with any faux plants to make them look more realistic.
Materials
I bought some real soil at the nursery, and some pretty rocks at the dollar store. The glasses vases were some I already had, but if you needed them they’re from the dollar store.
- real soil
- real rocks
- glass vases or pots
1. Get Good Fakes
The best way to make your fake plants look more realistic is to start off with some good fakes. They're so many available today. Even if you have budget ones that look a bit plastic, the other tips will help, but starting off with realistic faux plants will certainly help.
Here are my tips for finding great ones.
- Make sure there's some color variation. Real plants have different shades of green and varation. Good fakes have this too.
- Look for faux plants that feel real. Hard plastic leaves are a give away that they're fake.
- Not too perfect. Real plants don't always look perfect. Great fakes have some varation in leaf size, and how open the buds might be.
2. Use Real Soil
I removed the faux plant from the plastic pots, and then pulled the styrofoam base it was glued into. Then I filled up the bottom of the vase with soil, and submerged the the plant, making sure the bottom was completely hidden by the soil.
You could do this in regluar pots for faux plants that you don't want in vases as well. Put them into beautiful pots and top the pots up with real soil.
3. Use Real Rocks
Next, I inserted the plant back into the styrofoam, and added a layer of the rocks over the soil. So easy.
Using real soil and rocks really made the faux plant look much more realistic.
4. Mix In Some Real Pants With the Faux Ones
I also included some real cactus. I found some small ones at a local nursery for around two dollars each so I bought several to add to the mix.
This step really makes a difference. Your guests will see the real plants and just assume that the fake ones are also real. Top tip: make sure the real ones you mix in are low maintenance so that they keep looking great.
It is a bit difficult to maneuver the real, and very prickly cactus into the tall, narrow vases.
Here are my tips. Add some soil to the vase first. Then dig a small hole, so that it's coming up the sides a bit. This way there is room in the middle for the plant.
Hold the plant with some kitchen tongs and lower it into place. Carefully add soil to the sides. Use the end of a wooden spoon to compact the soil into place around the plant.
And, if you do get some soil on the plant and it’s stuck in the thorns, use a straw to blow it out.
Best part about this little project is that the finished project is very low maintenace, even the real ones.
I just need to make sure I tell my husband not to accidentally water the faux ones.
With real looking faux succulents, life really is a party!
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Frequently Asked Questions
These faux plants were from the dollar store. The price was right, but they weren't the best quality. Look for better quality faux plants at the craft store.
If you water them frequently they might develop rust from the wire stem, or markes from the water dehydrating on the glass, or even grow mold. But if it's an infrequent mistake, the water should evaporate and cause no harm.
If you try any of our ideas on How To Make Your Faux Plants Look Real or any other ideas on the blog please let me know how it went in the comments below. Thanks for visiting today!
dnr says
Janet, love mixing the real and the faux. Sounds great.
Dannyelle
janet says
I have several of the faux ones. I also have a real one in a clay pot. It looked so lonely all alone. So, I added a faux alone side. No one is the wiser!
dnr says
Thanks Carol, best of luck with the project.
Dannyelle
Carol says
Amazing how real the faux succulents look I am definitely going to do this. This is awesome!
Thanks for sharing.
Carol P-K