DIY Arch/Arbor

H built ours. It was by far my favorite piece of décor. Ours was wood and cost us about $70 in wood, stain, and other materials.

I haven't attempted this yet, but that same photo is my inspiration for what I want to do! My dad is going to help us make it. I looked at prices for copper piping on home depots website and had estimated we could do it for around $150. We will see if that actually happens. Then my venue is charging $50 to set it up the day of. They also gave me a quote to do the flowers for it but I can't remember how much that was. If you try it, make a post of any tricks or tips you learned and I'll do the same!

@TRJessie so I thought of this! But I also read that PVC is not really meant to be spray painted and it might not hold up? Thats my only fear with doing it, PVC is obviously easy and cheap enough to get!

@kristin thats so funny since we are date twins! i have actually seen some on etsy for less than 150 if you wanted to buy

https://www.etsy.com/listing/544183683/copper-backdrop-wedding-backdrop-wedding?gpla=1&gao=1&&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=shopping_us_a-weddings-decorations-aisle_runners_and_decor&utm_custom1=055146cf-9fd3-444a-a754-abe837fc65c4&gclid=Cj0KCQiAl8rQBRDrARIsAEW_To8VsrcTL6jXrWyLdh8UVXaB7NSXevbg5pUJJ0uX4OJs5DYIIxYA3nkaAqf8EALw_wcB

https://www.etsy.com/listing/572125601/copper-backdrop-wedding-arch-wedding?gpla=1&gao=1&utm_campaign=shopping_us_Bobsgeneralstore_sfc_osa&utm_medium=cpc&utm_source=google&utm_custom1=0&utm_content=11479630&gclid=Cj0KCQiAl8rQBRDrARIsAEW_To9C6tvy7w6ZvdNnd6xIj_cjkbb_dREAnGSTD_ctmxSpvE8tLhOAK8EaAttlEALw_wcB

Our venue has an arch in the garden where we're having our ceremony that we're allowed to decorate, so we're DIYing our florals for it! definitely if you have to build it yourself, use PVC or wooden round dowels and spray paint. it will save you so much money. we're using 3 or 4 floral garlands, some of flowers and some of greenery, twisted together to do our arch decor. this could work for you too, you could spiral them around and cluster it closer to give it this full effect! Michaels and Hobby Lobby have been our best friends for this. we're going for this kind of feel! (see image)

The PVC pipe could likely be primed and then painted, but as for not "holding up", I'm assuming you will have it stored somewhere until the wedding so it shouldn't need many touch-ups leading up to it.

Thanks @EngineerInLove! i guess i am more concerned about the connection points, in case we did have to break it down the day before the wedding to transport it to the venue? The paint might strip? Which i guess is not that big of a deal since we could put florals in those spots.

FH is in charge of our arbor. A crazy wind storm blew through Vermont and other parts of New England a couple weeks ago and took down a lot of trees. One of his co-workers has some really nice birch that either came down or need to come down anyway. He's letting us haul away what we want for free.

But I'm letting FH do the assembling - it's up his alley as he likes to work with wood and he's far more engineering-inclined than I am.

We bought 8 bamboo poles from a former bride for $20 (FB market) and FH is going to spray paint them and put it together.

It would likely cost about $150 for the copper piping and all the connections. That's just buying stock lengths of pipe.

You could sell it all after.

You can spray paint PVC pipe with the newer paints like Krylon Fusion.

I like the copper pipe too! Priced it out and it would only be about $60 to make which I need to do soon so I have some patina on it. I don't want bright copper to glint too much in the sunlight.

Copper pipe is actually pretty cheap ..

Krylon and Rustoleum both make quality copper finish spray paint you can use on pvc for a fraction of the price of real copper. Best wishes!

I would 100% see what PVC pipe looks like sprayed with copper spray paint! Probably worth looking into - love the look!

Thanks for all the feedback ladies! I need to actually go and price out the piping, my fiance said he thought it was pretty pricey but it would be worth it to DIY for 100-150, I'm sure we could sell it after, too.

Hi Nicole, are you able to share any more details about how you built/what you bought? I'm trying to do this as well for my August wedding so I don't have to my florist $800 for the structure but I've yet to find any details DIY tips online and my finance and I aren't the most handy with these kinds of heavy duty materials. Would love any advice/suggestions/etc! Thanks, Rachel

Do you have dimensions of what size pipes/connectors you used?

I know this is an old post, but my Dad just built a copper arch for us (he's a plumber, so it's a little homage to him for our wedding), and I'm wondering what you all did to weigh down an inside copper arch in a way that was pretty? The florist suggested sandbags & fabric, but I'm not sure how to make that look nice. Any updates?

My dad used 1/2 inch copper, made a 6 foot wide by 8 foot tall arch, which we are cutting to be a little shorter (more like 5 foot by 6.5 or 7 so it definitely shows in pictures) and it cost him maybe $110 in copper with all the connectors.