Feb 21, 20237 min read

Wedding flowers - DIY and up-cycling!

Thinking of saving money and doing it yourself?

Last year 22nd April 2022, our family friend Caroline married Neil. I offered to do their flowers as a pressie. That also took the pressure off me having never done wedding flowers before, so there was a lot of trust on their behalf and a bit of youtube learning for me.

I'm going to say it, flower arranging (ducks the arrows from the professionals) is not that difficult and you WILL save a small fortune.

Get a 'tiny' notebook, (have lunch) and chat detail. Make a list of runners and riders, who is carrying or wearing what.

Find out what the bride wants and doesn't want. Caroline wasn't afraid to say, 'No peacock feathers thanks Pauline'! She was also keen for her mum in law Pat to have a special corsage.

Recce the venue with the bride (have lunch), work out what you can hang where and what's going on tables and chairs, what the venue provides - the linen etc.

The wedding lady at the venue was top drawer because Caroline was open to her suggestions.

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The top tip, buy from a wholesaler that sells to non trade, there aren't many.

I can highly recommend Triangle for their 'easy to use' website, top quality flowers and prices.

What can you use that you already have at home? Vases, baskets, glass pate dishes, trays, ribbon.

What do you need to buy? Faux flameless candles (the hotel didn't allow live flamed candles - made sense to us).

Caroline found some great bargains on line.

This is the folded white organza which was pre-cut to length and pre-hemmed.

Have a play with them on a chair. Great fun and super easy!

Caroline found small plastic filled test tubes on line.

I put the same flowers in each tube, and pushed each tube into a foam filled tin for safe transport.

At the venue each tube was tied into a simple 'one tie half knot' in the organza on the backs of each chair.

This took no time at all (40minutes all up), helped by Carolines lovely daughter Chloe.

A sprig of Rosemary from the garden was added to each tube, so that guests picked up the lovely scent.

We bought 3 gold colour hoops from Hobbycraft and tied the organza to each one.

Then added a test tube to one side and some hand made blush beads at the bottom.

They hung from the ceiling and looked pretty fabulous and such a simple thing.

Hiring things like stands is expensive.

Up-cycling the odd piece added to the uniqueness of the decor.

This wooden stand was £14 on facebook market place, it was originally brown.

It worked well against the panelling in this corner, where there had been a tatty unloved house plant, which the hotel were happy to remove for us.

The thin floristry green tape.

There is no mystery.

It wraps around the stems and becomes sticky when stretched.

As you twirl the stems and add flowers with one hand, you wrap and stretch the tape around the stems with the other hand, it simply sticks to itself!

We bought that from The Range.

'Conditioning'

A term used by the trade, it's simply the same thing you do when you get given a bouquet yourself. Ideally the day before the arranging, cut the stems at an angle soak in water and remove any petals or greenery that aren't looking great or that you don't need.

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This is Carolines grandson Beau's little page boy corsage. My first test piece.

Muscari, Gypsophila and 3 tight budded roses (no foliage), the blue Muscari was in flower in my garden because it was an April wedding and blue flowers are not only rare but super pricy. As I made each piece I 'what-sapped photos' to our girls, Jess and Lizzie, to seek their critique, which was very helpful and encouraging. The wedding date was also our daughter Jess's birthday which she was very gracious about.

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I used florists green foam/oasis (not great for the enviro' I learned later).

I soaked it throughly before using. Using jute (string) to tie the foam in each basket was simple enough.

It's helpful if you are already an up-cycler!

Carolines bouquet as a work in progress...

Keep checking the bridal and bridesmaids bouquets in the mirror to make certain they look right from every angle and have a flounce about at the same time!

Carolines accent colour was blue, otherwise it was white, cream and a soft peach blush.

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When it comes to arranging put all the greenery in first and if you know a friendly gardener use the evergreen foliage from their garden. This saved HALF of the flower budget.

This photo below is mostly the 'fillers' using foliage, the flowers come later.

Give yourself enough TIME or work in the dark! (Everything was kept outside in the cool). I did feel a bit of time pressure ...but still loved it.

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Here are some more of the top quality plants from Triangle. Working outside was helpful cause once you start the mess just flows, so its easy to sweep up after.

(I did learn that Hellebores do not work well and drooped badly - I soon removed them)

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This is an old French baguette and wine basket. It was quite a feature by the registrars table.

These are a few of the different filled vases and pots some bought. some new.

They were prepped and put in bread baskets ready to travel in the car.

I put paper and foam between them to stop any damage on the journey.

They also had enough water in them, but not too much, so that nothing needed doing to them at the venue.

These are used glass pate dishes. We covered the outside with hessian using a glue gun and some gold wire and tiny beads to upcycle them.

Then filled them with flowers and greenery. The bluebells from the garden and daisies from Triangle looked pretty. The brown back drop is a box keeping the plants shaded from the sun.

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We bought 3 of these glass domes from The Range.

I added some foam, some daisies and a small faux battery flame.

(We spent a lovely time painting them from white to blush using acrylic, because the white was too stark).

They were placed at distance from each other down the middle of the dining table.

The glass was the right tone of blush/pink/peach.

This added a different shape and looked quite classy.

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Adding a touch of gold ribbon to this pink house plant pot with a glue gun uplifted it a treat!

I pushed the flower stems into oasis foam in the base, to keep the flowers still.

Some floral displays were kept white/cream with simple green.

Using evergreen curly leaves from the shrub Pittosporum from our neighbour Lindas garden.

Using the soft small flowers of Ammi majus 'Visnaga' and the Chrysanths' and Gypsophila amongst the bigger flowers added a delicate touch.

The Ammi has quite bendy stems, you can insert florists wire or wind wire around the stem, but I tried and that was a faff!

I didn't bother.

I just used sturdier plant stems around them to prop them up. Easy!

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There is a reason why Gypsophila xlence (common name - babys breath) is so popular it's dainty and beautiful and softens the blunt look of large flowers.

Buy more of it not less, because it's really useful.

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There are different colours (and costs) of 'main' big flowers like tulips and roses, I bought midway, cost wise. These cream Tulips 'Cheers' were a bit softer than stark white.

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Playing around with positioning the displays at the venue meant that people kept out of my way (I turned a bit diva!).

It was very handy having baskets with handles, no damage to the flowers!

There are no rules, so mixing different containers gave an added interest rather than everything being 'samey'

The different roses (here - Rose Alpe de Huez') come in different stem lengths, very uncomplicated.

A sharp slanted cut removing about 2 inches, for water uptake.

Just remember not to do a final second cut until the very end when you've done the bouquet or estimated the length for the vase or whatever.

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Here you can see the de-leafing of the roses, no de-thorning, it wasn't needed. You can see I rested the heads on the edge of the drip tray to support them. I used a Triangle delivery box to shade the plants when 'conditioning'. Very enjoyable it was to!

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I placed them all in the shade, in buckets of fresh water. Conditioning them all and putting them back in the buckets in the same groups ready for doing the arranging.

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THE SHOCKER !

Yep thats the Triangle order, £190 ! Shocker isn't it. This doesn't include the floral tape, foam, globe vases, hoops but all up I think I spent approx' £350. A bargain and lots of reuse and up-cycling and importantly lots of learning! Yes you could argue it helps if you know plants.

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CONFESSION TIME! I wanted to be 100% certain I had enough of everything and you can't really know that until you have done the flower arranging, which of course is right at the end by which time you cannot order more flowers.

So... 🚘

Three mornings running at 0800hours I was at Lidls doorstep ready to buy their fresh flowers, off the lorry and in store from Northern Ireland.

I'd had a chat with a helpful lady in store and explained my dilemma and her imparted knowledge became my floral security blanket! Perfect.

Great flowers, silly prices.

Large and small button Chrysanth's, and Lillies...

Roses... £2.29 a bunch !

Such superb value and quality.

If you had the courage maybe you could do it even cheaper but Lidl simply don't carry the volume of specific flowers.

So yes there was carnage...

Our cool side passage was a perfect way of

getting things in order in my head!

Only one car load...using bread baskets and buckets for vases and things...

Making the displays work in the intimate classically decorated Victoria Room

and

the all important gin and tonic...

Baskets and trays lifted otherwise uninteresting corners..

Carolines finished bridal bouquet, she loved it phew!

Photo by Emma Adams

Photo by Emma Adams Left to right Ellie, Kerry, Caroline and Chloe

The different vessels, glass domes and a central gold tray, with hand painted water colour napkin tags and place names worked well, Caroline and Neil loved it, which was the main thing after all.

Photo by Emma Adams Beau, Caroline, Neil and Chloe