How To Make a Charming Spring Decoration from Egg Boxes

This sweet DIY spring decoration transforms egg cartons and egg shells into a row of delicate flowers in tiny decoupaged egg vases. It’s an easy upcycling craft that looks lovely on a spring table or mantel.

Spring always puts me in the mood for making cheerful decorations for the home. This little display is perfect for a mantelpiece, shelf, or spring table, and it’s made almost entirely from things that would normally end up in the recycling bin.

The whole project has a fun egg theme and is actually made up of three simple crafts:

• Delicate egg box flowers
• Tiny decoupaged eggshell vases
• A handmade air-dry clay egg tray to hold everything together

Six little eggs in a row, each with its own spring flower, make a charming decoration that feels very seasonal. And the best part? Almost everything is made from upcycled materials.

Inspiration Behind This Spring Egg Display

Eggs always feel like the perfect craft material for spring and Easter. I’ve used them before in a few projects (you can see some ideas in my Marimekko egg decoupage tutorial), and they’re surprisingly versatile.

For this project, I wanted to create something a bit more decorative, almost like a mini spring flower arrangement, but with a playful recycled twist.

Materials You’ll Need

For the Egg Shell Vases

• 6 eggs (shells saved and emptied)
• Decorative paper napkin (I used a Marimekko cherry blossom pattern)
• Decoupage glue or PVA glue (slightly watered down)
• Small paintbrush
• Pin, skewer, or needle (for making a hole in the egg)

The Egg Box Flowers

• Cardboard egg carton
• Floristry wire and tape (for stems)
• Acrylic paint (white, pink, yellow and green work well for spring flowers)
• Small paintbrush
• Scissors
• Skewer or needle (to make holes in the flowers)

For the Clay Egg Tray

• Air-dry clay
• Plastic egg carton (used as a mould for the tray) or cardboard carton and cling film.
• Rolling pin or bottle (for rolling out the clay)
• Craft knife or clay tool

Craft 1: Decoupaged Egg Shell Bud Vases

The first step is to turn empty eggshells into tiny decorative vases.

Preparing the Egg Shells: Using a pin or skewer, carefully make a small hole in the top of the egg and gently enlarge it just enough so the yolk and white can be poured out. Drain the contents into a bowl (perfect for making an omelette later!). Once the egg is empty, rinse the shell with warm water to clean out any remaining egg, then leave it to dry completely before decorating.

You’ll want six eggs if you’re making the full display. Egg shells are surprisingly delicate, so the next step strengthens them.

How to Decoupage Egg Shells with Paper Napkins

Decoupaging the eggs serves two purposes: it decorates them and reinforces the shells. Paper napkins work beautifully for this because they’re thin and easy to shape around curved surfaces.

How to decoupage with napkins:

1. Separate the napkin layers and use only the top printed layer.
2. Tear the napkin into small pieces rather than cutting it; this helps the edges blend in.
3. Brush a thin layer of decoupage glue or watered-down PVA onto the egg.
4. Lay the napkin piece over the surface.
5. Gently brush more glue over the top to seal it.

Top tip: Choose a busy pattern rather than a large repeating design. It makes the decoupage much easier because the pattern doesn’t have to line up. Let the eggs dry completely before moving on.

(You can find more detailed instructions in my paper-napkin decoupage tutorials.)

Craft 2: Making Spring Flowers from Egg Boxes

Next come the flowers, made from egg boxes. Egg cartons are one of my favourite craft materials. They’re sturdy, easy to cut, and perfect for making flowers.

For this display, I made two types of flowers, snowdrops and cherry blossoms.

Snowdrop Egg Carton Flowers: Cut the tall centre section from the middle of a cardboard egg carton. Trim and shape the edges into long, narrow petals to resemble the delicate shape of snowdrops.

Next, cut a few small rectangles from the egg carton (about 1 cm x 2 cm). Snip fine fringes along one edge, then roll the pieces up tightly to form the stamens for the centre of the flowers.

Cherry Blossom Flowers: Cut the individual cups from an egg carton and trim them into 5 broader, smaller petals. Also, make the same small cardboard stamens for the centre of these flowers.

Painting the Flowers: Once the flowers are shaped, paint them in soft spring colours with acrylic paint.

• Snowdrops: white petals with a hint of green
• Cherry blossom: pale pink petals
• Stamens: Yellow

Once dry, the flowers can be gently shaped to make them look more natural.

Assembling the Flowers: Glue the painted yellow stamens into the centre of each flower. Then, with a sharp tool such as an awl, pierce a hole in the base of each flower. Wrap a piece of floristry wire with tape, then thread and glue it through the centre hole to make a stem.

Craft 3: Making an Air-Dry Clay Egg Tray

Now we need something to hold the little egg vases. Instead of buying a tray, I made one using air-dry clay and a plastic egg carton as a mould. (You can use a cardboard carton with clingfilm instead.)

Step 1: Cut a strip from a plastic egg carton containing six egg cups in a row. Roll out air-dry clay into a slab large enough to cover the strip.

Step 2: Lay the clay over the egg cups. Press the clay gently into each hollow to form the egg shapes (I used eggs for this).

Once you’re happy with the shape, trim the edges neatly. Leave the clay to dry completely. This creates a perfect custom tray that holds the eggs securely.

Step 3: Decorating the Clay Tray. Once the clay is fully dry, I decorated it to match the eggs. The tray was decoupaged with the same Marimekko napkin, which ties the whole display together. Use the same napkin decoupage method as before.

Assembling the Spring Display

Now the fun part, putting everything together. Place the decoupaged eggs into the clay tray. Fill each egg with a little sand to give it weight and stability. Insert one egg carton flower into each egg.

The result is a row of six delicate spring flowers sitting in their tiny egg vases.

It’s a lovely decoration for a mantelpiece, dining table, windowsill or even an Easter display.

The egg vases can also be filled with water and used as mini bud vases for real spring blooms.

More Spring Crafts You Might Enjoy

If you enjoyed this cheerful DIY spring decoration, there are plenty more seasonal crafts to try on the site. My air-dry clay cherry blossom trinket dish is another lovely blossom-themed project and makes a perfect little catchall for jewellery or keys.

And if you have a few egg cartons left over, don’t throw them away; they’re ideal for making my cute bunny portrait egg carton craft, which is great for spring or Easter decorating.

You might also like browsing the other spring and Easter crafts on Pillarboxblue, including my decoupaged egg wreath, another fun way to decorate eggs for the season. There are lots of creative projects using simple materials like cardboard, paper napkins and air-dry clay, perfect if you enjoy easy upcycling crafts.