Easy DIY Potpourri with Foraged Flowers & Herbs

Last Updated on December 12, 2024

Want your house to smell amazing? This easy homemade potpourri is a snap to throw together and can scent your home with lovely smells for weeks. Using foraged and inexpensive ingredients, a simple DIY potpourri also makes a great gift.

WHAT IS POTPOURRI?

In the days before air fresheners, people trying to mask unpleasant odors turned to the fragrant plants they had on hand. Often they were simply strewn across the floor, but they might also be placed in fabric sachets or simmered to disperse their scents.

Potpourri is simply a collection of dried plant materials meant to add pleasant smells to a room. Potpourri can be decorative and left in a bowl, or you can make potpourri meant to be simmered on the stovetop.

As someone who favors making things last as long as possible and requiring the least amount of effort, I’m going to recommend the kind that sits in a bowl.

Stovetop potpourri recipes not only waste energy using the stove (or if you want to do the simmer method with less energy, a crockpot could work), they’re single use, and often include ingredients that could be eaten. I’d rather eat food rather than use it to scent my house.

In my opinion, you’re better off making a cranberry sauce, spiced apple cider, or some homemade elderberry syrup if you want to both enjoy the smells AND use the contents of your “simmer pot.”

In general what I put in a bowl would not otherwise be food, though some could theoretically be made into herbal tea or medicine. But the loss is considerably less than simmering an actual orange or some cranberries in a stovetop potpourri.

Plus, they’re so pretty!

WHY MAKE DIY POTPOURRI?

Maybe you’ve eyed attractive jars or bags of potpourri for sale. They often have strong chemical scents and cost an astonishing amount for a simple collection of dried plant materials.

Don’t be bamboozled into buying these overpriced packages infused with chemical fragrances that are best avoided. According to the Environmental Working Group, ‘fragrance’ is a catch-all term for any of the 3500 chemicals used to create scent. These unregulated chemicals may be harmful to human health, and companies including them in products are not required to disclose which they use.

A homemade potpourri, on the other hand, is a collection of pretty, scented plant materials you collect or have on hand, whether foraged in nearby woods or scavenged from your garden or kitchen.

A gorgeous DIY potpourri with an uplifting scent is a great way to give yourself a little boost if you’re one of those people who hate winter.

Plus, like all my favorite DIY projects, homemade potpourri takes no skill at all, and very little time. If you can place some dried plants in a bowl and drip a few drops of oil on it, you’re all set!

–> If you’re looking for other brilliant low-skill DIYs, be sure to check out these insanely easy DIY bath salts and homemade sugar scrub.

WHICH PLANTS TO USE FOR HOMEMADE POTPOURRI

If you’re looking to make DIY potpourri on the cheap, start by looking in your neighborhood and garden for things you can use.

Pine cones are easy to find, attractive, and last a long time. You may find other dried seed heads or pods on foraging expeditions also.

Some common plants you might find in your garden include echinacea, cornflowers, straw flowers and lavender.

You can use lavender leaves as well — they smell wonderful! And here’s how to grow lavender from seed if you haven’t already got some in your garden.

If you grow a medicinal herb garden, many of your favorite herbs can be dried and used to scent your homemade potpourri.

Some herbs to consider include

• Roses
• Lavender
• Rosemary
• Lemon verbena
• Bay leaves

While you’ll want to choose some plants for their smell, also give some thought to what will look nice in a bowl. Pine cones, cedar cuttings, and orange slices or citrus peels look beautiful together.

Certain herbs you can buy easily also have some beautiful potpourri potential, like star anise, rosebuds or rose petals, whole calendula blossoms, cloves, cinnamon sticks sunflower petals, hibiscus calyxes, and hops blossoms.

Dried fruits or berries can add visual interest as well. Dried orange slices make a beautiful contrast with darker plant materials and are a snap to make.

WHICH SCENTS TO USE IN DIY POTPOURRI

Now let’s talk about the smell you want your potpourri to waft through your home.

Around the holidays, the scent of pine or peppermint feel especially appropriate, though both are wonderful at other times of year as well. Cinnamon and orange are other choices to consider.

Other lovely scents include soothing lavender, uplifting lemon, or fragrant rose. This boxed set would let you try all sorts of scents, which you could use in DIY potpourri, bath salts, massage oils, or a personal diffuser.

Depending on which plants you use in your potpourri mixture, they may have scents of their own, but even if they do, you’ll probably want to amplify them with a few drops of essential oil. The scent from dried plants won’t last very long, but adding another drop of oil from time to time will refresh the scent, and even allow you to change it slightly if you like.

Some oils to consider:

• Bergamot — One of my all-time favorites, its lovely smell may help with stress relief
• Geranium — A pleasant floral scent said to help with mood and stress. It goes well with roses if you’re including them in your potpourri
• Lavender — The relaxing effects of lavender is well known. An especially good choice for potpourri in bedrooms.
• Lemon — Bright and cheerful lemon makes any room smell fresh and clean.
• Peppermint — The scent of peppermint is considered especially helpful for boosting energy levels.
• Pine or fir — Brings the scent of the forest to your living room.
• Vanilla — Makes your home smell like baking, even when you don’t have time!

Some people use what’s known as a fixative to help the scent last longer. Orris root powder is a common choice, but not everyone likes the look of the powder. Vetiver root is another, but if you’re using woody materials like pine cones and seed pods, they should help hold the scent without buying these extras.

WHERE TO GET POTPOURRI INGREDIENTS (& HOW TO SAVE MONEY ON THEM)

I recommend starting with what you can forage, and filling in with other materials to create something you find aesthetically pleasing.

Pick up attractive pine cones from the ground, snip a few sprigs of cedar or rosemary, scavenge for dried seed heads. Dried echinacea flowers look especially nice, as do straw flowers.

Then take a look around your kitchen. Put aside some peels when you have an orange and let them dry. Use some in orange peel tea, and keep the prettiest ones for your potpourri bowl.

–> Check out more genius uses for orange peels, and you’ll never throw them out again!

Check your herb cabinet for other things you might enjoy seeing in your potpourri, and then visit your local natural foods store’s bulk section to get just a few star anise or cinnamon sticks and other pretty or fragrant herbs you’d like to include.

If you don’t already have essential oils on hand, I recommend buying one or two you’ll find yourself using again and again. Peppermint is a great choice, as there are so many uses for peppermint oil, from pest repellents to headache relief.

I love keeping bergamot around for its uplifting scent and use it often as a natural air freshener, carpet deodorizer, and add-in to my DIY bath salts. Visit a store with a collection of essential oil testers and see what scent appeals to you most.

Check out our beginners guide to essential oils if you haven’t used them much before.

For topical use, I recommend high quality oils, like those from Plant Therapy (also available on Amazon). They’re high-quality, but very affordable. But for things like cleaning, pest control, and projects like DIY potpourri, a big bottle of less expensive oils may make more sense.

This huge bottle of peppermint oil will last a very long time. You’ll find some similarly sized bottles linked in the section above.

My favorite places to find great deals on essential oils for household use is Vitacost, which regularly has fantastic sales that bring down the cost significantly. Use the codes they suggest, and you can easily save more than 30% over other sources. Here’s a link to their essential oils.

I’ve used a cash-back program called Rakuten for years to get rebates on tons of online purchases, sometimes as high as 25%. You can get a $40 bonus when you join using this link.

HOW TO MAKE DIY POTPOURRI

What you’ll need:

• Selection of plant materials (pine cones, cinnamon sticks, dried orange peel or slices, bay leaves, etc.)
• Essential oil of choice
• Glass jar with lid or bowl
• Fixative, like vetiver root (optional)

Instructions:

Arrange the plant material in the jar or bowl. Add 3 drops of essential oils, ideally on something woody, like a pine cone or cinnamon stick, which will hold onto the oil longer than something more delicate, like leaves or flowers.

You can place the bowl out immediately or leave the potpourri in a jar to soak into the mix for at least a few days, though some claim several weeks help ‘cure’ the potpourri for longer-lasting scent better.

Because essential oils are volatile, you can leave the jar closed and open it only when you want the scent to escape, and it will stay potent longer than if you left it out. The curing process may help the smell lsat longer if you want to leave it out. But adding a few additional drops of oil when you want the scent should cover you as well.

Notes:

Because you’re using essential oils, don’t use any of the ingredients you put in your DIY potpourri to make tea or other things you plan to consume.

Since wood can absorb oils, it’s best to use ceramic or glass rather than wood bowls to display your potpourri unless you have a wooden bowl that is not otherwise used for food.

FAQS

How long will the scent last?

The scent of your potpourri without essential oil might not be strong enough to smell. With essential oil you’ll be able to smell it most for the first day or two. If you keep your potpourri in a glass jar with a lid, the smells will last longer, and you can just open it when you want the scent to escape.

The scent will last longest if you allow essential oil to absorb into woody material like pine cones or wood shavings. Keeping the potpourri covered will also help keep the volatile oils from evaporating and preserve the scent for when you want it.

Scent can be refreshed with a few additional drops of oil.

Which flowers work best in homemade potpourri?

Flowers that keep their shape and color are especially nice in DIY potpourri. Small rosebuds, straw flowers, globe amaranth (gomphrena), and statice flowers (the purple ones in the photos above) keep their color and shape nicely.

Every tried making your own potpourri? Leave a comment with your favorite ingredients if so!

Save this info on how to make DIY potpourri for later!