How to Wrap a Cylindrical Gift [Everyone Will Love It]

When it comes to gift wrapping, the faithful square or rectangle is the easiest shape to wrap. We love 90-degree angles and flat edges to work with and you can easily make your gifts look superb. But what about the unforgiving cylinder?

Cylindrical gifts can be tricky to wrap but there is a simple technique that makes the process that much easier. In this guide, I explain how to wrap a cylindrical gift including things like wine bottles, jars, and candles.

Step 1 - Gathering Your Supplies

As always, I like to be prepared first and make sure I have my supplies. This saves time and makes sure I’m not continually running to my craft store or kitchen to find items! Wrapping essentials include:

• Wrapping paper.
• Scissors.
• Pen or pencil.
• Tape.
• Ribbon or other decorations.
• Gift tag.

The wrapping paper is important and you should opt for a higher-quality make to prevent tearing when rolling and pleating. Don’t forget to consider customized wrapping paper options too to make your gift that much more memorable.

Step 2 - Measuring and Cutting Your Wrapping Paper

Measuring the wrapping paper beforehand is essential to reduce waste and to make sure you have enough to cover the entire cylinder. There is nothing worse than rolling the paper around your gift only to see a huge ugly gap because you haven’t cut the paper long enough!

The wrapping paper must be wide enough to completely roll around the cylinder with an overlap. This can be difficult to measure so the best practice is to simply do a trial run. Place your gift on one edge of the wrapping paper and while holding the paper to the gift, roll it until all the sides are covered.

You can then mark the desired overlap point using your pen or pencil. Make sure you have left a decent overlap too.

For the top and bottom, the paper must be taller than the cylinder is wide. Confused? If your gift is 3 inches wide at its widest point, you should make the wrapping paper 3 inches taller than the gift at the top and bottom. This gives you enough paper to pleat the top and bottom properly. You can now cut the paper!

Step 3 - Roll the Wrapping Paper Around the Gift

With your perfectly cut wrapping paper, you can now get rolling! Place the gift at the left-hand edge of the sheet of paper. While holding the paper against the side of the gift, roll them together as you did in the measuring phase until all the sides are covered.

Make sure you get a tight roll so the wrapping paper doesn’t have any creases. When the sides are all covered, you can tape the joint to secure it.

Step 4 - Pleating the Bottom

When looking at how to wrap a cylindrical gift we use a process called pleating. You are essentially folding the excess paper over in a circular pattern with the folds going into the center of the gift.

First, take hold of one piece of the excess paper at the bottom and fold it down towards the center of the gift. You then have to move to the left and repeat this process - folding the sides down until you have completely covered the bottom. You can then secure the pleating with a small piece of tape.

Step 5 - Pleating the Top

If the top of the gift is flat too then you can repeat the same pleating process that we used for the bottom. However, some cylindrical shapes like wine bottles have a tapered top where pleating doesn’t really work.

In this instance, we can use a scrunch-and-tie method. All you have to do is carefully place your hands around the excess paper at the top and bring them together in a scrunching method. Some people like to twist the scrunched edges, but you can leave them as is too.

It’s then a simple matter of using a ribbon or tape to tie around the scrunch at it’s thinnest point.
Step 6 - Adding Decorations

If you want, now is the time to add decorations such as glitter, the gift tag, ribbon, and bows. This is entirely up to you and comes down to personal preference! After this, your cylindrical gift should be finished and it should hopefully look like a masterpiece of gift wrapping.

Wrapping a Cylindrical Gift Doesn’t Have to be Difficult!

I hope you now have renewed confidence in your wrapping skills and are ready to tackle those tricky cylindrical shapes. No longer do you have to fear wrapping things like wine bottles, candles, and jars of candy! Just remember the roll and wrap technique and your gifts will look superb every time and impress the recipient!