The wedding flowers turned out beautifully, the only thing wanting was a pair of extra hands or two….. because doing the floral work for a wedding is a very big job!
I worked like crazy, and I’ll have to say more about the details later, but I wanted to recommend two of the most helpful books, and I researched in numerous ones (along with all the Bridal magazines). Malcolm Hilliers Book of Fresh Flowers
and Wedding Flowers Made Simple
by Steven Roberts. These two were especially elegant, artfully illustrated and replete with all the basic instructions an amateur like me needed. I had worked with silk and dried, but had not worked with trying to make a professional result in fresh floral arrangements. These books gave me confidence, they gave me ideas, and they gave me lots of pictures!
If you are more interested in fresh floral design for many occasions, I would choose the Hillier book,Book of Fresh Flowers: A Complete Guide to Selecting and Arranging. It was the most complete, but anyone could do the flowers for a wedding with the wedding flower book by Steven Roberts. I benefited from both books in planning, ordering, and preparing table arrangements, two large entry arrangements, boutonnieres, and all the bridesmaids bouquets.
I did order too many flowers though. About two hundred too many I think. I could have used them in extra arrangements if I had more time and didn’t have to split the morning with getting myself ready! I was in a hurry and burnt my fingers really badly with the glue gun, but didn’t care because I had to crank out those bridesmaids’ bouquets and get them there looking good on time.
I really can’t believe I attempted that- but the bouquets actually turned out quite successfully! I had bought 6 inch wide velvet red ribbon on sale… beautiful pink and white organza wired ribbon and had red and bicolor cream white and red roses in a hand tied bunch, with a collar of tree fern and baby’s breath around. The glue came in to cover the wired stems with a wrap of red ribbon which was then tied with the pink in a simple bow with trailing streamers. Very pretty against the deep red of the dresses. The Jr. Bridesmaids had the same bouquet against soft rose pink dresses. I think I mentioned that at first I didn’t like the pink red white green theme, but it coordinated beautifully, it really was a standout color scheme- and not all schmaltzy sweet like I imagined.
My daughter turned out to have had excellent taste. I will have to give more details later.
Here is a picture of the wedding party:
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