I had the honor of attending a very high end wedding over the weekend in Beverly Hills, Ca. I could go on and on about all the beautiful clothes, jewelry, people, cars, celebrities, food and décor, but for the sake of this blog post, I am going to focus on the FLOWERS.
The bride loves bling…diamonds, crystals, anything sparkly, but she doesn’t like a lot of color. So she chose an all white/ivory theme with slight pops of green…no greenery, but green cymbidium orchids here and there and hanging green amaranthus.
The centerpieces were tall with three different styles used throughout the ballroom. On the long tables, which were one sided, there were many short vases with white roses along the edges in between the tall centerpieces. Each of the tall centerpieces incorporated some bling, mostly in the form of rhinestone ribbon wrapped vases, stands and risers, but a few of the tall centerpieces also had hanging crystal strands.
The stage was also elaborately decorated and served as a huppa or Chuppah (Jewish canopy beneath which the couple stands while the ceremony is performed).
The stage/Chuppah décor had lots of painted white Manzanita branches protruding with hanging crystals and hanging flowers dangling at the front of the stage.
The main flowers were white hydrangea, ivory roses and dendrobium orchids. In this case there was no budget and my estimate is that they spent between $35,000 and $50,000 on the floral décor and draping. Not many couples can afford to spend that kind of money on their flowers. However, even with a much smaller budget, brides can create a similar affect by using a mass of one type of flower and one color…it’s one of those insider secrets we florists keep. And, you should know, that white flowers, especially at night or in a dimly lit room represent the MOST elegant color to use and will give you the biggest bang for your buck.
Here is a close up of the third style tall centerpiece, which happens to be the centerpiece at the table where I sat.
Notice that lots of candles were also used and many were in “mercury glass” containers…mercury glass looks like a silver antique look was added to the glass, the silver is faded and unequal in appearance – meaning, it looks like it is faded or chipped in places and not uniform in appearance at all. As I look at this photo, I see a short cylinder vases with the mercury glass accents and it looks like a silver vase that has lost part of it’s paint. Silver is a great bling accent color to use with white.
Only the bride and groom had flowers. None of the bridal party, parents, siblings or special guests received flowers.
The bridesmaids all wore champagne colored dresses of their choosing, so the dresses did not match other than in color and they were all long.
Regardless what your budget is for flowers, take a lesson from this wedding…using all the same type of flower and all in the same color palette will make your budget go farther than mixing and matching several different colors and will look like you spent more money than you did.
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