May wedding

My friend Denise married Heather earlier this month and they asked me to arrange their flowers. As I actually attended the wedding, I have seized the opportunity to produce a wedding blog which shows the wedding party with their flowers. Usually, I deliver the flowers and never get to see them with the people! Heather and Denise got married at Peckforton Castle in Cheshire – a really lovely, dramatic setting (thanks to 1and1photography for the castle images).

They asked me to make arrangements of spring flowers in kilner jars finished with lace and blue ribbon to decorate the castle. I used bluebells, sweet william, pinks, alstroemeria, eucalyptus and solomon’s seal from Cornwall, together with sea holly, veronica and astrantia from Sheffield Flower Market.  Then I mixed in some white and pink roses and gypsophila to add a bit of wedding romance. The jars were placed on the window sills and the sides of the mantelpiece in the Great Hall.

Then I arranged a couple of jars for the registrar’s table (thanks to 1and1photography for the second image below).

I also made a large arrangement which I placed in the entrance to the Great hall.

Denise wore trousers and a waistcoat, whilst Heather wore a traditional wedding dress in a subtle champagne colour. They wanted their own flowers to complement each other and decided on shoulder corsages – these are a small gathering of flowers pinned onto the shoulder. Usually these are wired (that is to say the heads of the flowers are chopped off and then attached to a wire – this makes it easy to manipulate the flowers into shape and keeps the corsage light). I don`t like the idea of chopping the heads off flowers, so was keen to find a way of making the corsages with whole flowers. I used white roses, freesia, gypsophila, bluebells, rosemary, and ivy. I was really pleased with the result (thanks to 1and1photography for the close up):

And here they are signing the register:

I used white and blue for all the wedding party – this matched the bridesmaids’ dresses and the young men’s ties/cravats.  Instead of posies I made wrist corsages for the bridesmaids. Again, I used white roses, freesias, bluebells, gypsophila, rosemary and ivy. I finished them with lace and attached them to the bridesmaids’ wrists with pretty silver bracelets. I thought they looked really classy and were a great alternative to a posy.

The young men had buttonholes made from white roses, sea holly and gypsophila.  A splendid match for the bridesmaids.

Whilst Denise and Heather were posing for pictures with their bridesmaids, there was a wonderful moment when a peacock strutted by in all his pomp. His blue feathers were just the same colour as the bridesmaids’ dresses!

The thing about wedding flowers is that they draw together and embellish all the members of the wedding party. Just like this:

The table centres were placed on top of slices of wood taken from trees felled from the Westgate Centre in Oxford (where Denise and Heather live). The wood slices had been made in a workshop in Blackbird Leys in Oxford by people with learning disabilities. This was a thoughtful, personal touch because Denise has been working on the Westgate project and Heather is keen to promote the wood slices for use in wedding decoration. They worked really well with the kilner jars…….what a great product to promote.

Finally, here is a picture of Mike and me with Denise and Heather (thanks to 1and1photography ). It was a very special day and I was so pleased to make a contribution to it with my flowers.