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Home » DIY Projects » DIY Faux-Real Indoor Tree

DIY Faux-Real Indoor Tree

February 24, 2021 | By Jenna Sue DIY Projects

Have you ever dreamed of having a beautiful, large indoor tree that would require zero maintenance, last forever and wouldn’t cost an arm and a leg?

  • via Jillian Dinkel
  • via Galerie Provenance
  • via Brown Design Inc
  • via Jase Campbell

Fellow black thumbers rejoice, I have found the solution. If you followed my Instagram stories during the making of this tree, you know I ran into a few challenges and this project was a lot more work than originally planned. I had my doubts up until the very end, but then it all gloriously came together at once. Lucky for you, I made all the mistakes so you don’t have to repeat them 🙂

I wish I could take credit for this brilliant idea, but I saw it circulating on Instagram recently and on Pinterest even before that. I just had to try it for myself, and as much as I like the 8′ olive tree in the living room, it was time for a change.

So I tracked down a couple ficus trees ($25 for both) on FB marketplace and we were off to the races.

I wasn’t married to the idea of a ficus tree, but for some reason, about 90% of the faux trees I found on marketplace were ficuses. These looked realistic enough and the price was right—the only problem was, all of the leaves on the second tree were red underneath (I couldn’t really tell from the photo online).

That wasn’t the look I was going for, but I had already set aside the day to make this tree so I figured I’d just paint them green. Seemed simple enough, right? But first I had to trim all the leaves off with wire cutters.

Before painting them, I stripped back the plastic at the bottom to expose the wire, which would later be inserted into the new tree branch.

With all of the branches cut and trimmed, it was time to get rid of the red.

I dug up some old paint samples and a couple tubes of acrylic paint to mix the color to the right shade.

As it turns out, the right shade of green required a lot of yellow paint, and I didn’t have enough.

As it also turns out, painting leaves is a messy job and I couldn’t prevent it form getting all over the front of the leaves.

I went on a mission to find more paint that would possibly be less permanent so I wouldn’t have to spend hours scrubbing dried paint off the front of the leaves. I found this washable tempera paint:

It seemed to be going pretty well at first…

Until the paint started to dry, and disappear before my eyes.

At this point, half the day was gone and I hadn’t even touched 90% of the branches…

So I gave up on Plan A and moved onto Plan B—find a new ficus.

Fortunately they’re not hard to find around here, and $40 later I had a new tree to work with the next morning. There was just one problem with this one…

The stems were a dark green, which isn’t as realistic and didn’t match the other stems (on the right). Time to break out the paint again…

Fortunately, painting stems is much easier (and cleaner) than painting leaves. I spent an hour or two and got through about 70% of them before my hand started cramping and I decided my tree didn’t need any more leaves.

Tip: someone pointed out that Michael’s sells the same leaves for $2/stem! You can save yourself some time/money and just get these. I would guesstimate 20-30 are needed, depending on the size of your tree.

With the leaves out of the way, it was time to find a tree branch to cut down! This is the key to creating a super realistic looking faux tree. We only had one tree on our property that could work, so I carefully examined each limb to find one that was relatively upright and balanced.

Here it is!

I cut it down to approximately 100″, which is slightly taller than the 8′ olive tree it was replacing.

Then it was time to prune. This is another step that could be skipped if you live somewhere cold with leaf-less trees in the winter (I guess there’s one benefit to living in the snow ;))

I left most of the branches/smaller twigs on at this stage—those would be later trimmed off after I filled the tree to my desired shape.

Next, it was time to plant the tree in a pot. I found an old bucket lying around and filled it with quick-set concrete mix.

Then used clamps to hold the tree in place while the mix hardened. Tip: this is a great solution to re-pot/stabilize the base of any faux tree, since the pots they come with are so small!

Once the concrete was set, I carefully transported my tree inside. Note the scale in comparison to the three fake trees—and the difference in shape. This is is why the end result of this project looks so realistic!

In the other tutorials I watched, they used a small drill bit (approximately the size of a single branch wire) to drill a hole into the branch…

Then inserted the wire. I found this to be a little tricky, as it was tough to control the angle of the drill bit and it kept coming out of the other side.

Nevertheless, this is the best way to attach the leaves to your larger branches and it looks very convincing. You can also use hot glue/gorilla glue to keep it in place if you’d like, but it stays put fine without it.

However, most of my branches were too small for this method, so I planned ahead and bought brown floral tape to secure them that way.

It looks wonky in the photo above next to the lighter branch, but you honestly can not tell at all once you stand back. Here’s some better examples…

The great thing about this project is that you really don’t need to get it perfect—there’s so much going on and everything blends together. Honestly I probably could have even skipped painting the branches and it would still look quite realistic.

I used the drill bit method on maybe 3-4 of the larger branches at the bottom, but all of the rest were secured with floral tape (much quicker and easier!) I even added a branch on the back to fill in an empty area. You’d never be able to spot it once the leaves were added…

It was at this stage that I breathed a huge sigh of relief—all of my efforts weren’t wasted. This tree was coming together just as I had hoped!

Once all the leaves were added and I was happy with the shape, I trimmed back a lot of the excess branches and moved it into its new home. And here she is now…

I’m loving how it looks in my DIY ‘stone’ planter.

Let me consolidate this into a simple tutorial, without all of the extra unnecessary steps/mistakes I made!

Materials

  • Faux tree (ficus works well, make sure there are enough leaves and it looks realistic) OR faux stems (like these $2 ficus stems)
  • Real tree branch
  • Wire cutters
  • Drill/drill bits
  • Floral tape

Directions

  • Use a wire cutter to clip the stems off of your faux tree (or skip this step if purchasing stems separately)
  • Optional: paint the stems brown if desired
  • Locate a tree and cut down a branch with the general size/shape you want
  • Prune any leaves off of the branch
  • Place the tree branch into a bucket with quick setting concrete mix, allow to dry
  • Use a small drill bit to drill holes into larger sections of the branch and insert the faux stems
  • Use floral tape to wrap the stems to the end of your smaller branches
  • Continue until you are happy with the shape of your tree
  • Trim away any excess branches

Even though this wasn’t exactly the quick and easy project I thought it would be, if you avoid my mistakes and choose the right faux tree (or stems) from the beginning, it can definitely be a one-day project and 100% worth the effort, in my opinion! Large faux trees are so hard to come by—I’ve actually never seen one even close to this for sale, so you can’t really put a price on it. It’s a one of a kind!

What do you think? Would it be worth it to you? I’m predicting we’ll see a lot more of these pop up in the future. Who knows, maybe I’ll bring myself to make another one too 😉

If you like this project, check out these popular budget DIYs from my Project Library!

  1. How to realistically age wood (the easy way!)
  2. DIY Faux Stone planters
  3. DIY String Light Planters
  4. DIY Hypertufa Planter

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How to build an arched doorway opening
Previous Post: « Closet Makeover: Phase 1
Next Post: French Bistro-Inspired Patio Dining »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Lindsey says

    March 20, 2021 at 5:47 pm

    Did you dry the branch out or treat it for bugs, I’m so excited to make mine and I found a broken magnolia branch in my neighborhood that I have in my garage now and I’m just worried of bugs ??

    • Jenna Sue says

      March 22, 2021 at 10:47 am

      Hey Lindsey! I did not treat it — I didn’t notice any bugs before or afterwards 🙂

  2. karen sunday says

    February 25, 2021 at 10:56 pm

    Fantastic!! Is what I said seeing your rooms!!! and very cool tree !!!!

  3. Jennifer says

    February 25, 2021 at 4:12 pm

    I am totally blown away by this!! The thought of DIYing my own never occurred to me! I literally just sold 3 fake ficus trees on MP about 2 weeks ago, grrr…I’m so mad now, lol! Thanks for the great idea! Cheers from a fellow Florida resident and DIYer, Jennifer (@decorsauce) in Melbourne.

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 25, 2021 at 10:02 pm

      Haha maybe I bought my three trees from you ;P You should buy them back and do this project!

  4. Carly says

    February 25, 2021 at 10:46 am

    Great job on the tree and styling of it! I agree it’s impossible to find large trees and if you do the price is high. FYI on finding faux plants to recycle the leaves. One word….Goodwill. For cheap you could have saved at least half the price you paid for yours at Goodwill. May take some time to know which Goodwill stores in your area have the better selections of things but totally worth it in the $ savings. Love your tree!!

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 25, 2021 at 2:12 pm

      Thank you Carly! Thrift stores are definitely a great option to check out too if you have the time to go in person. We have some goods ones around here!

  5. Audrey says

    February 25, 2021 at 3:37 am

    You knocked it out of the park!! I bet your eyes keep drifting back to it to admire your beautiful work! This is exactly what I was needing to help me complete my vision. I want to make a small version for the Amazon cat litter box planter that came with some tiny palm leaves. I wanted to DIY a ficus tree rather than olive but wasn’t convinced it would look real. I’m convinced!!! Thank you for the great tutorial and all the helpful pictures!

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 25, 2021 at 2:11 pm

      This sounds like the perfect solution for you! Kitty will love it too 😉

  6. Ivory says

    February 25, 2021 at 12:34 am

    I simply put, don’t not have the words to say how fantastic this diy turned out. That you did an amazing job. I will be doing this-this summer. So happy I found your wonderful site.

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 25, 2021 at 2:11 pm

      Thanks Ivory, I’m so glad you like it!

  7. Pam says

    February 24, 2021 at 6:09 pm

    I love that tree. Seems like alot of work thou. May i ask, how do u keep ur cream couch looking so clean? I bought one about 1.5 years ago and i need to have it professionally cleaned.

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:09 pm

      Hi Pam! So far I have only spot treated and that seems to work pretty well. Sooner or later I’m sure I’ll have to wash it but the slipcover is removable so hopefully it won’t be too much of a problem.

  8. Viana says

    February 24, 2021 at 4:00 pm

    Where is your base from? Is it also DIY? ?

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:01 pm

      Hi Viana, yes it is DIY! I linked it in the post 🙂 https://www.jennasuedesign.com/2020/04/diy-hypertufa-stone-planter/

  9. Erin says

    February 24, 2021 at 3:31 pm

    Such a great project! I am definitely gonna have to try this one! Thanks for the inspiration

  10. Christie says

    February 24, 2021 at 3:26 pm

    Can you tell me what kind of planter you put it in and where to get it. ❤️ It

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:01 pm

      Hi Christie, it’s a DIY planter! https://www.jennasuedesign.com/2020/04/diy-hypertufa-stone-planter/

  11. Monica says

    February 24, 2021 at 2:47 pm

    Another great DIY – it looks so real!

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:08 pm

      Thanks Monica! It’s wild how realistic it looks in person. Way better than I had imagined!

  12. Linde says

    February 24, 2021 at 2:23 pm

    Amazing, now I want won! You’ve completely inspired me!!

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:07 pm

      You can do it, Linde! I have faith!

  13. Michele M. says

    February 24, 2021 at 1:06 pm

    Yours is the best one I have seen out there- efforts worth it big time.

    Love your “exhaustion” pic – made me smile.

    Well done!

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:07 pm

      Thank you Michele! That is the face of relief ;D

  14. Pamela Cribby says

    February 24, 2021 at 12:33 pm

    Bravo Jenna Sue… Your creativity and following through with your thoughts you have in your mind….. Blow me away… I LOVE everything you and Lucas do.. If you lived near me I would hire you in second… I hope all is going well in your world there in Florida.. Thank you for all you share with us… Your simply the best… Hugs from Washington…
    Pam

    • Jenna Sue says

      February 24, 2021 at 9:02 pm

      You are too sweet Pamela, thank you so much for the kind words! I’m glad you are enjoying the projects 🙂

Welcome!

Hi, I’m Jenna and I’ve been designing and DIY’ing my way through homes since 2008. Join me as I learn, share my experience, and hopefully encourage/inspire you along the way!

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