Emma and Pete wedding

We did our first 'suprise' wedding last weekend. Obviously the bridal party knew, and Emma did end up telling a few people but most of them thought they were coming to her 30th Birthday but suprise (!) it was her Birthday but it was also their wedding day!

Emma is a photographer http://emmacasephotography.blogspot.com/ based in Birmingham and so has been to MANY weddings as the offical photographer so has seen probably more weddings than I have! Probably one of the reason that it was a suprise wedding!

So, what flowers to have for a girl that has done more weddings than she can probably count!> The dress was the real inspiration from http://www.furcoatnoknickers.co.uk/ ! It was a vintage inspired dress, really simple and beautiful. You can see it at http://www.rocknrollbride.com/ . Also the bridesmaids dresses (which still weren't 100% confirmed even the week before!) were going to be a mixture of different colours. So we wanted a vintage but colourful look.

We decided the flowers should to look gathered, obviously professional but not too 'contrived' if that makes sense! So we decided on some soft but vibrant orange roses, purple lisianthus, orange ranunculus, purple static and pink wax with hints of white gypsophilia. All the different textures and colours complimented each other perfectly and I think really made a beautiful vintage inspired bouquet, button hole and bridesmaid posy.

I can't wait to see a few more photos of the day and I have to say it's been lots of fun working with such a relaxed fun loving bride!

Making you flowers last longer

We often get asked what's the best way of making stems last a longer. Almost everyone I meet has a different tip on the subject so it's tricky to know what to tell people. Also some stem need to be treated differently to others.
There are lots of 'old wives' tricks like lemonade, a penny in the bottom of the vases, sugar in the water, to name but a few but personally I can't advocate enough, fresh water, this is what they would be drinking in there natural habitat after all. We tell people to try and change the water every couple of days. The best way to make sure this isn't too big a task by not filling your vases to the top with water. If your changing it often the vase will never run dry and quite a lot of flowers don't like to be up to there ears in water! Things like callas, gerberas and tulips have soft delicate stems so will absorb water into the stem disintegrate and make them all soggy and slimy! Nice! this also means that the water gets very dirty and extremely smelly.
Making sure that the part of the stem that is in the water is free of leaves. Leave have a lot of 'bacteria' on them. Not horrible crawly bacteria, just dirt from the environment that they have grown in or transported by. So leaving the leaves in on the stem and sitting them in water will make you water dirty very quickly. Also re-cutting the stem really helps. When flowers are out of water for any length of time they dry over at the ends which makes sure that they don't loose any water but also means that no water can get in. SO re-cutting the stem before you put them in the vase is an absolute must. Also after you have changed the water it's a good idea to re-cut the stem as if the water has been dirty the stems will seal over and that seal needs to be opened. You don't have to cut much off unless they have been out of water for a long time.
Cutting 'woody' stems- thick robust stem at an angle will create a bigger surface area and so give the stem a better chance of getting plenty of water. Soft stem flowers can be cut straight across as they have no problem drinking and in some cases like gerberas and tulips are quite greedy with the water that they drink which is why their heads often flop over.
Also making sure that the place that you are putting the flowers is as cool as possible, not next to a radiator or in a draft if possible.
Enjoy!

Event floristry

One of the best and most stressful parts of our business is doing flowers for events, whether it is for a wedding or other event, bringing amazing colours and freshness into what can be very sterile environments always makes such a massive difference.

Obviously we are normally guided by the type of event it is we are doing flowers for. Say if it is a wedding we generally speak to the bride about the colours and style of the rest of the day. The bridesmaids dress, the brides dress, where they are getting married and where the reception is being held. The time of year is also a big influence to the sort of flowers that going to be used. There are a lot of flowers that are all year round but still there are some flowers, popular ones like peonies and hydrangeas that are still really quite seasonal. If they can be brought out of season they will be very expensive and could be substandard quality.

For different events for example a companies annual conference the company colours usual take part in the choice of flowers. It's a good place to start anyway! If it is a big conference of say 100 tables or more budget will most likely be a big factor. Most companies wouldn't want to spend more than £10-£15 per table on flowers so choice is dramatically narrowed. Also if you are having to make a hundreds of an arrangement, normally having to make them up the day before, you want to make sure the arrangements and reasonably simple to do.

If you can see the venue before the day that you are due to set up and speak to the organisers or owners of the venue about the logistics, timings, drop off places etc then that will make life much easier on the day of delivery and set up.