I needed to decorate about a half an acre of her woodland picnic area wedding venue on the cheap. So I came up with the idea of making these paper hearts on a string. I designed and made about twenty of these looped paper hearts, pretty much just a modification of those paper Scandinavian stars everyone learns to make in middle school. I love them but they kind of take forever — measure, cut, staple, recut, loop, staple ad nauseam.
So here's how to make them…
What you need:
- Pretty paper/book pages. I used the pages of an old coffee table book about Hawaiian volcanos, so there's a nice variation in color between the lava shots, jungle shots, and black and white text pages.
- Ruler
- Boxcutter or exacto knife
- Pen
- Scissors
- Stapler
- Something to cut over so you don't wreck your table
Step One
Measure out your paper in 1.5″ increments — you'll need seven strips for each heart — and cut as evenly as you can with the boxcutter. If it's not totally straight all the way down, not a huge deal (but do try!).
Step Two
Fold one strip neatly in half, and split the other six up into sets of three that you think would look nice together.
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Step Three
Grab your folded piece, fold side UP. This is going to be your center, and the top bit become the loop you can hang the finished heart by, so you want to be sure it's turned the right way up.
Step Four
Line up all your pieces together (three on each side of the folded strip) and staple once horizontally at the bottom about an inch up (or a bit less like here).
Step Five
To make each loop separate from each other and look nested, flip open your paper wad at the center. The two strips closest to the folded piece should be trimmed about three inches, and moving out from there, the next gets trimmed about an inch. Leave the outside pieces alone!
Step Six
Now you should have a crazy paper sea anemone/fleur-de-lis type thingy held together at the bottom, like so.
Step Seven
Grab your inside strip on one side (the shortest one) and loop it over, tucking it in towards the center. It should snug down pretty nicely and bump into your staple Repeat with the other two, so you have half a loopy heart.
Step Eight
Staple through the loops AND the center strip to hold things in place.
Step Nine
Now repeat the tucking and stapling on the other side and TADA!
Step Ten
Slide the string through the center loop sticking up out of the heart and string them up to use as decor anywhere!
Ahhhhh! I’ve just started making these too! They’re so simple, but so eye-catching. Great article! 🙂
They look quite delightful!
I can’t use these for my wedding, but I’m damn tempted to make some and string them up around the house! Well done!
I can’t wait to see them in action! 🙂
they look great, I’m just wondering if they would work with magazine paper or if it would be too flimsy?
Hi jellybecaly! I bet you it would totally work with magazine pages, but you might want to experiment with a stiffer paper type for your folded center bit, just in case the whole shebang decides to droop one direction. I always made the scandinavian stars with just plain computer paper, so the odds are good:)
Adorable!!!!
I’m gonna hang these in my house!
What a great tutorial! I love that it’s reusing something destined for the trash!
This is PERFECT! Thank you for sharing! I am going to add antique keys to the bottom (both for weight and to follow my vintage hot rod theme) and hang them outside and in the tent 😀
At the end of the Christmas season we have a pile of cards, I’m going to use this year’s pile to make decorations for next year’s celebration!! They will be smaller, but still charming. Thank you!
I love this. Im having a small outdoor wedding next spring and we are pretty much using all DIY ideas. This will be one!!!
freaking love these! what a great idea!
im getting married in april and wanted something unique but large enough to really be seen and cover alot of area all at the same time. these are fantastic! i cant wait to get started on them
Saw this yesterday, loved the idea, by bedtime last night I was surrounded by hundereds of hearts! Thanks for this idea, they will be great for our outdoor wedding
I’m so glad you posted this tutorial. I will definitely be making these for my wedding in May using vintage comic books.
What a fantastic idea and tutorial, thank you! I just finished making 25 of them out of red, purple, light pink, and dark pink strips of construction paper to celebrate our 10th Valentine’s Day together (took 90 minutes, maybe a bit more). Mixing up the different color strips for each heart resulted in a really neat, interesting look, giving each one more of an appearance of depth.
We’re making these from the pages of love poems! Using older books gives us a more antique look than bright white.
These Are Super Cute!! I Can’t Wait to Start Making These…Thanks For Posting! 🙂
Thanks for the great idea! Being a science nerd by trade, I think this may be the perfect use for all of those extra issues of “Science” magazine I have lying around!
Not for a wedding but for children’s craft and literature day – and one of them is titled ‘Made with love’ by Melinda Szymanik.
http://melindaszymanik.blogspot.co.nz
Ideal, thank you – even in a simplified version.
I just have to say, I found your site about a week ago, while I was looking for more stuff, to feed my OCD monster, I have found a lot of fun stuff, and I have laughed so much, I can see straight! Thank you all for having so many amzazing ideas and for keeping it real!