Creative Ideas for Making Your Own Model Trees

Making your own miniatures can be a ton of fun, no matter what hobby you’re into. Dungeons & Dragons, Warhammer, and many other popular tabletop games use 3D minis to make battlefields look like real places. You can also build miniatures for dioramas, model trains, and stationary works of art. In this article, let’s take a look at some creative ideas for making your own model trees.

The Quick Tree Method

We’re going to show you two completely different methods for making trees. Each one uses different materials for the trunk and leaves, as well as different adhesives. However, you can mix and match these materials as much as you want to get the type of tree you want. First up, let’s look at the quick tree method.

1. Make a Wire Trunk

Cut 16 to 20 pieces of stiff crafting wire, all approximately the same length. Begin twisting all the wires together at one end. When you get about halfway, start separating them into 3 to 4 twists, then separate those into individual branches. Paint your wire trunk whatever color you like.

2. Using Deer Moss for Leaves

Deer moss is an inexpensive crafting supply that comes in many colors. Bunch it into small clusters and hot glue them to the wire trunk branches. That’s it!

The Realistic Tree Method

You can use pre-made trunks or make your own for more realistic-looking trees. We’ll show you how to make your own from scratch. This is our favorite method for adding greenery to a model train layout or other hyper-realistic dioramas.

1. Making the Trunk

For a more realistic trunk, you can do a couple of things. One way is to make the wire trunk in the quick method but cover the wires in paper mâché, plaster, or green stuff (aka epoxy putty). You can texture these materials to create wood grain.

2. Using Flocking As Leaves

At many craft stores, you can find bush-style flocking, which is a clumpy green type of fake greenery. You can either use a spray adhesive and shake the flocking over your trunk in layers or hot glue individual clumps of bush flocking to the branches.

3. Highlight With Additional Colors

Add a layer of lighter green or even yellow-green flocking on the top of your trees for even more realism. This will look like sunlight is hitting the tops of the trees.

We hope you’ve enjoyed these creative ideas for making your own model trees. Just know that there are no hard and fast rules, and you can always swap in materials that you already have on hand.