Do you have any crystals around your home? They’ve become so popular over the last little while that even if you don’t have any of your own on display, you’ve likely heard all about their possible benefits and healing properties. Whether you believe these claims or just love the look of crystals, they sure are fun to collect and arrange! Today we’re using metallic pipe cleaners to make some crystals and gems of our own – they’re a whole lot more affordable than the real thing!

If you’re a crystal and gem enthusiast, you can even recreate ones using the colors and meaning as inspiration! Metallic pipe cleaners are perfect for this because they give a nice shine and sparkle, especially in the sun. Arrange groupings of these pipe cleaner crystals anywhere in your home: a window sill, bookshelf, or even as a centerpiece! Keep reading for the full instructions below.

• Metallic pipe cleaners (various colors)
• Scissors

Step 1
Start by forming the base shape for your crystal – we used squares, pentagons, and hexagons. Make it whatever size you like! When crafting larger crystals (like the holographic white one pictures in the images earlier) we first twisted two pipe cleaners together so that we had enough length to form the hexagonal base. Once you’re happy with the base, twist the pipe cleaner together to secure it in shape and cut off any excess.

Step 2
To build the edges of the crystal, twist the end of a matching pipe cleaner onto each corner of the base shape. We used full-length pipe cleaners here to give us lots of room and length to make the crystal nice tall, but if you prefer a shorter crystal, you can first cut the pipe cleaners in half before attaching

Step 3
The next step is to form the upper edge for the crystal, again using a matching pipe cleaner. If you needed two pipe cleaners attached together for the base, do this for the top edge as well. Decide how tall you’d like the crystal to be, and begin twisting each of the pipe cleaners around it, keeping them as even as possible. You can use a ruler for this if you like, but eyeballing it should keep it even enough too.

Step 4
Now with the excess pipe cleaners that extend up past the top edge, twist them together in the center, forming a peak. Cut off any excess pipe cleaners and make sure all the pointy edges and wrapped, secured, and tucked away nicely.

Step 5
Repeat this process as many times as you like, using different colored pipe cleaners and making various shapes and sizes of crystals and gems.

Happy crafting!