"Picky, picky, picky" OR "Why I Heart My Floral Designer"

I am a detailed bride. I am a planning-a-holic. When you're a bride that treads a fine line between picky and neurotic, it helps to have creative and understanding vendors on your side. :)Luckily for me, I have been blessed with such talented and patient professionals - people who have received countless emails clarifying what I do and do not want on the wedding day, and respond promptly and professionally.

For example, an exerpt from one of my emails to my lovely floral designer:

Dear Ms. Meade

....I am impressed and very excited to work together! Let me tell you my "vision" as a starting point to our planning

My wedding is an black tie formal evening wedding on October ? 2008.

• I'm having a 1950s- inspired vintage wedding
• I'm wearing an ivory satin ballgown with a cathedral train
  
• The bridesmaids will be wearing knee-length "(Dior's) New Look" silhouette pale pink dresses with silver pumps, pearl necklaces, pearldrop earrings, and updos (possibly with little hats and birdcage veils).
  
• The groom and groomsmen will be wearing ivory dinner jackets, black pants and shoes, and black bowties.
  
• The colours are: pastels (pink, robin's egg blue, buttercream yellow, ivory), splashes of hot pink, silver, gold, and crystal/sparkle
  
• Motif: peonies, hearts, birds ("birds of a feather flock together")
  
• Keywords: " dollhouse wedding,"Swelegant" (ie. swell + elegant), "whimsical" "charming" " "tooth-achingly sweet-like-a-pastry"
  
• My tablecloths will be champagne pintuck satin, the chairs will be white with champagne silk sashes. This colour combination is very subdued, so as to provide a backdrop to the centerpieces instead of competing with them. It will also look fabulous by candelight.

This is from an introductory email - 14 months before the wedding date, and less than a week after my engagement. :p
I am still surprised (and grateful) that she didn't run away screaming "Bridezilla!" But no, my floral designer Larissa is a woman of great talent, and great courage.


Did I mention talent? I completely heart Larissa Meade of Bridal Beginnings.

Not only has she been willing to discuss, accomodate, and improve upon my floral vision, she has also made ingenius suggestions for improvisation.
Exhibit B: PEONIES IN THE FALL









Besides cheese, pasta, baked goods, and Mr. Beefcake, my true love is the peony flower. Unfortunately for anyone getting married in summer, fall, or winter, peonies can be hard, if not impossible, to find out of season. My hopes were raised by Larissa's mention of Chilean growers shipping a second batch of those petal-ed beauties in November every year, but were quickly dashed when she noted that



1) your date is very early for their season, they usually don't start shipping till end of October - would not know till 2 weeks out, as it really depends on the soil condition, weather, etc etc etc.
2) due to your date, they would be shipped much smaller and tighter -no guarantees on condition and whether they will open

3) you need to order a minimum of a 100 stem case

4) the price per stem is OUTRAGEOUS - $8-9.50 per stem (so like$1000), and you have to buy the entire case, regardless of thecondition etc that they arrive in. It's not a case of "oh, they don't look good, they're too small, they're too tight, i don't want them"


Hopes were dashed, pre-menstrual tears were threatening to spill, but then she noted that we could "consider ...Lisianthus [and use] different size roses (full import roses, local roses,mini spray roses).... to create different textures.....for a touch of green, we can use bells of ireland, hypercium berries"



(lisianthus)


Hooray! And here was the clincher:
(seriously, suggest this to your florist if your wedding date precludes peonies)






3-4 carnations (the bouquet in her left hand) can be grouped tightly together to give a soft, full, fluffly peony effect! Brilliant!




The negotiations continued, with my mondo-huge list of likes and dislikes - accompanied by diagrams, nach.







LIKES: pink, creamy whites (not yellow whites) buttercream yellows, pale, soft greenstextureinteresting cuffs and details (feathers, etc, I'll design)(besides cuff of greenery - but not banana leaf for mine)wide double faced satin ribbon with monogram keywords: "soft' "fluffy" "whimsical" "big" "pink" "sparkly"structurecompletely covered stem ends (raw ends MAYBE for BM bouquets, but Iwant mine covered, esp for dress safety) round, but not perfectly symmetrical in terms of bouquet contents (ie,not too perfect)

Is that even English? Yeesh. I scare myself.
We hashed out the details, jpgs were exchanged




And we came to an agreement (cue Handel's Messiah chorus)!

My bridal bouquet will be a mixture of the following three bouquets:



(but no banana leaf)

and my personal favorite:




With a bouquet wrap similar to this, that I will provide:





Larissa quickly and correctly deduced that my "centerpieces are also really important... so we want them to be a WOW feature" and made some super smart suggestions that may apply to any bees out there with tented weddings:

A) tented wedding = no tapered candles ...they will blow out!
B) using only tall centerpieces can be overpowering because they visually compete with support crosswires


Our centerpieces will thus be a mix of short and tall, with the short centerpieces mixing light and blossoms, but relying more heavily on candles (votives, candelabras, etc) and interesting containers for visual "oomph"






and our tall centerpieces will be responsible for bringing in the "WOW" factor. These will combine tall fluted clear vases with large floral arrangements in the same shades as my bouquet (pinks, whites, buttercream yellow, and soft greens), crystal strands (dripping from the flowers, or suspended within the vase), and lots and lots of candles.








Now that the details are done, I can sit back and drool at how perfectly pink and frothy and feminine our wedding decor will be - cough - I mean, gender neutral and elegant (trust me Mr Beefcake, letting me choose pink as a wedding colour was a good idea ;))...