How to Make DIY Christmas Trees with Rope, Jute, Twine, and Yarn

Learn how to make DIY Christmas Trees with handmade paper cones, and then wrap them with rope, jute, twine, and yarn.

Rustic Christmas decor is popular and for good reason. It's simple, elegant, and can be dressed up by adding color.

We are going to make our own rustic decor today; DIY Christmas trees made by wrapping cones with rope, jute, twine, and yarn!

Let's see how it's done!

DIY Christmas Trees with Rope, Jute, Twine, and Yarn

Step 1: Gather Supplies

Supplies Needed:

• Cones - styrofoam cones or cardstock to make your own paper cones
• Hot Glue Gun and Glue - (be careful of glue guns that get extremely hot, because they can melt the styrofoam cone. My cordless HART hot glue gun ended up being WAY too hot. My mini hi-temp hot glue gun worked much better.)
• Scissors
• Rope, Jute, Twine, Yarn
• Packing Tape - (optional)

Step 2: Optional - if you are using a styrofoam cone as the foundation of your DIY Christmas tree, you can add a layer of protection by wrapping it with packing tape.

This creates a barrier between the hot glue and the styrofoam, protecting it from melting as easily.

Step 3: Hot glue the beginning of the rope along the bottom edge of the cone.

This is going to be the BACK of the DIY Christmas tree.

Put hot glue around the cone and secure the rope.

Step 4: Continue gluing the rope around the cone, from the bottom up.

Step 5: If you run out of rope, cut and splice a second rope at the back, in line with where you started wrapping.

Trim any excess from the first rope off at the same vertical spot where you began gluing the rope.

Then begin gluing the second rope from that same spot. (To the right of where my thumb is in the photo below.)

This way, all of the starting and stopping of the rope are on the BACK of the DIY Christmas tree, and the front will be seamless.

Step 6: Continue wrapping and gluing the rope up to the top of the cone.

Step 7: When you have wrapped and glued the rope, you will have created a hole in the top point of the Christmas tree. 

To finish the tree, you will insert the end of your rope into this hope, and glue it to secure it.

To make this easier, I taped the end of my rope to prevent fraying, because this type of rope frays very easily.

Insert the end of the rope down into the hole at the top of the cone, and glue to secure.

That's it! Your rope Christmas tree is finished!

Other Versions of DIY Christmas Trees:

You can repeat this same process with different types of rope, string, and twine.

DIY Jute Christmas Tree

Here, we are wrapping a styrofoam cone with jute rope.

NOTE: I initially tried using my cordless HART glue gun, but it got way too hot and melted the styrofoam cone like crazy, even after wrapping it in packing tape. This project worked much better when I used my mini hi-temp glue gun pictured at the start of the rope tree tutorial.

We spliced in a second jute rope in line with where we started gluing the rope.

When we got to the top of the cone and had created a hole, we glued the end of the rope into it to finish off the tree.

The jute Christmas tree is done!

DIY Twine Christmas Tree

In this version, we are using a DIY paper cone made with cardstock and hot glue. 

We are going to use the same process to wrap the paper cone in twine.

To finish off the twine Christmas tree, we hot glued the end into the hole at the top to secure it.

DIY Yarn Christmas Tree

Here, we are using another DIY paper cone, and wrapping it in thick gray yarn.

We used the exact same process as before.

These DIY Christmas Trees are rustic, classy, and just plain cute!

Plus, they are so easy to make. Most of the supplies came from the Dollar Tree, so they are very cheap to make too!

You can make your own DIY Christmas Trees with just a few simple craft supplies.

By using styrofoam cones or DIY paper cones as a base, and hot gluing string or rope of your choice around the cones, you can quickly and easily make beautiful rustic DIY Christmas trees that are ready to be used on your mantel as part of your Christmas decor!

You can also make mini yarn-wrapped trees, and fabric Christmas trees as well.