Charming Crowns (Stefana) for the Wedding Ceremony

As part of our ceremony, I decided to incorporate a crowning ceremony to recognize my fiance's Armenian heritage.   During the ceremony, weddings crowns are placed upon the heads of bridegroom and the bride.  Crowns worn by bride and groom are symbols of their own little kingdom or home.  Although our ceremony is going to be secular, I modified the ceremony as such to still incorporate the crowning.  However, to do all this I will need crowns! 

In the Greek tradition, the crowns are called "Stefana" and very common.  They can be made of metal, wood, ribbons and pearls.  Usually they are connected in the back with a long ribbon.  I began my search online and came upon some examples:

This one is available for 190 Euros here.



This one is available for $72.00 here.



This one is available for $175.00 here.

As you can see, these crowns are NOT cheap! So, I decided to make my own and there really were not many ideas online.  I found a tutorial for making a Christmas ornament out of an embroidery hoop and that's what gave me the idea for this project. 

1.) I purchased two embroidery hoops (about $1.25 per hoop), and you should see which fits your head best. 

I also purchased ribbon from Michael's which I got on sale for $1.00 per spool, make sure you have at least 8 yards of your first layer of ribbon.  Any additional layer of ribbon can come in 6 yards or less, depending how you wrap.  Here are the ribbons I used for the second and third layers ($1.00 each!):

I already had little pearl adhesive stickers from Michael's and a hot glue gun. 

2.) Then, I separated the inner part of the embroidery hoop (took off the part with the metal latch and kept the inside hoop with no latch). 
3.) For both crowns, I used only the inside hoop (no latch).  I began to slowly wrap the hoop in ribbon.  I put just a small line of hot glue on the inside of the hoop (no more than an inch)  because hot glue dries quickly.  Then, I slowly wrapped my first layer of ribbon on top of the glue, and made each piece of ribbon overlap. 

4.) After I completely wrapped each crown with my base layer ribbon.  I began to add some sparkly metallic ribbon in larger circles using the same method of glueing as before.

5.) When I was finished I had wrapped the crown completely with three different ribbons, two of which (the sparkly ones) were sort of intertwined (see below).  There was excess ribbon hanging off a small portion of the crown as well.

6.)  Then, I set about making the back bow and the ribbon connecting the two crowns.  First, I took the ribbon I wanted to use to connect the two crowns and glued one end to the inside of the crown at the same point where I had excess ribbon.

7.)  Then I took the excess ribbon which was hanging off the crowns (it was not the base layer, but one of the sparkly layers).  I glued it into a bow. The picture below isn't the greatest, but you should be able to see the connecting ribbon glued into the inside and the bow on the outside of the crown.

8.) I then pulled one of the sparkly ribbons over the front of the glued bow (like the knot) and I had an almost finished product.  I decided to add some embellishments by glueing on the little adhesive pearls I had around the crown and on the bow.  

9.) Here's what I came up with for a total of about $5.00 (depends on if you have the glue gun/glue and stickers).