WEDDING BOUQUETS -THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME?

I love creating a brides bouquet - from inception to delivery, it’s a mosaic of ideas brought into one final beautiful piece.
The bride to be, very rarely the groom – but when they are involved they are really involved, will start to think about the flowers.  They may have a favourite flower, or one that’s special to someone passed, a touch of rosemary for remembrance, or a dahlia as grandad had it on his allotment; they may love romantic roses, or luscious peonies or pretty wildflowers.  

The colour needs consideration – the bridesmaid’s dresses have usually been chosen by this stage and that can drive the colour theme of the flowers, you have to remember the dresses have been chosen because the colour is often a favourite of the bride’s.  Recently some brides are leaning towards the no-colour look – greens, maybe with a touch of white, a natural more textured foliage bouquet with minimal flower others will want a vibrant wow factor mix of colours! 

Some will be swayed by the season of the wedding – I loved the Halloween theme – pumpkins and sunflowers; a touch of burgundy to add warmth to a winter wedding, pretty hand-tieds full of tiny sweet smelling springtime delights. Then we need to think about the shape and size of the bouquet – a petite hand-tied bouquet like Megans, or perhaps a shower bouquet like the massive statement of Diana’s or the boho wild just picked that you’d image the “flake” girl to be holding. This can be decided based on height – no shower for a shorter physic; by personality – small understated, or wild and out there.  It’s very always uniquely personal.

Once you have gleaned all this information then you can get creative! What flowers will work in that season, what mix of flower shapes and colours will create this wonderful bouquet that will be part of their marriage history.  The flowers, I believe, are the second most important decision, behind the dress, they help paint a picture of each part of the day, in the church or venue, at the entrance, when you sign the register; at the top table, the bouquet will be part of most the photos to look back on and remember.
Once you have created the bouquet, as a florist you go through a few emotional stages, you love it – you know it’s perfect – you’ve listened to what your bride wants so you know it’s right, the flowers look and smell gorgeous – you are happy.  

Then you are on the way to deliver it – the doubts set in – what if she doesn’t like it! Perhaps it’s too big, too little, not enough pink, should’ve used a different rose, your stomach churns and you worry.  Then you arrive and forget all of these doubts – you enter a happy positive place and the bride and her bridesmaids are always delighted to see you – the flowers arriving are almost the first thing of the day that makes it all seem real.  They love their flowers – because they are theirs – uniquely theirs! Have a look at our video when we delivered Jess’s bouquet and you will see what I mean.

Why did brides start holding a bouquet? The history can be traced back to medieval times when sweet smelling flowers and herbs were used as a symbol of innocence and fertility and perhaps a little to cover other smells! I love the origin of throwing the bouquet – apparently the bride was seen as lucky, as she was getting married and all the single girls wanted to touch her to get some of this luckiness for themselves so the bride would throw her bouquet in an effort to get them away from her! The bouquet is still, if the bride is happy to part with their treasured bouquet, thrown and the lucky catcher is likely to be the next to get married.

What is fascinating to me are what bouquets have looked like through the last hundred years – I love to see old photos to see their bouquets – the shape, size the flowers.  I’m personally a fan of the big bouquets and my goodness during the 1920-40s they sure did have some big statement bouquets. If you have any of your families weddings I would absolutely love to see them. 
So where are we today with weddings with COVID19 in our lives?  Many couples are having to postpone their weddings until later this year or next year. My heart goes out to them, they have been planning this for so long – but maybe waiting will mean they have the actual wedding they have dreamed off.

I wonder if weddings will be different in the future – will couples think differently about their big day, will certain things be less or more important, will the bridal bouquets be different – I would love to hear what you think?
Let me know if you have read the blog and please let me know what you think, either here or on the fb page.  Please stay safe xx