Orchid Wedding Bouquets

My goodness these were good enough to eat!

One of my instructors, who was a past AIFD president, once told me that when you pick out flowers, it's like picking out fruits and vegetables. They should be firm, green, fresh and good enough to eat. If the stems are brown, soggy or the petals were a bit limp~ pass on it.
Would you eat a salad that way?
Huh. Good point.
So since then I remember this jewel she dropped on me and these orchids were so bright and fresh I thought, I could eat this freaking bouquet! lol

This bouquet was a slightly forward cascade with the folded Ti leaves in the back to give it a nice shape. I normally don't do cascades, but this one begged for it and when the flowers speak,
I listen.

The grooms boutonniere was a simple loop of the ti leaf and a single cymbidium orchid with a matching chocolate brown ribbon.

The happy couple went off to get married at the San Francisco City Hall ( My 4th City hall wedding this month!) and she looked so gorgeous in her dress with these flowers in her hands. I just know the other brides were jealous! HAHAHA! no, seriously, they were.

Much love and happiness to the happy couple and I can't wait to work on the big wedding later this year!

Succulent Bride {Part One: the Bouquet}

My succulent Bride and Groom contacted me about 7 weeks before their wedding with a fabulous request; Can you make a bouquet with succulents? YEP!

So we met one Sunday after noon and sketched out a bouquet and after the easiest hour of my life, we came up with a gorgeous bouquet and centerpiece we were all excited about. :)

The bridal bouquet was composed of three types of succulents, lotus pods, cream spray roses, Blizzard roses, china berries, yellow oncidium orchids finished off with an ivory satin ribbon.

I have a lot of pictures to share but I will be MIA this weekend with an event that requires almost 100 different pieces!!!

Have a great weekend!

Yellow and Copper Wedding Bouquet

Here is a trial run of the copper and yellow wedding bouquet I made this weekend.
It features rust cymbidiums orchids, yellow oncidium orchids, yellow and brown mokara orchids, yellow calla lilies, and black ti leaves.

Raspberry and Navy Blue {Part Three: Reception number 2 }

Part One
Part Two

Hello there! Here is the last post on my Raspberry and Navy Blue Wedding.

So what happened to my car? Who knows, but it didn't start and thank goodness a good Samaritan from the church where we were setting up heard that awful clicking that happens when a car doesn't start and came over to give me jump. He told me it was my alternator and I thought-no, it sounded the same as when I got stuck waiting for my Lavender Bride, and thankfully when he gave the car a jump start, my car started! Turns out I didn't have to sell orchids to make it to the next reception, hehe, but can you imagine your florist getting STRANDED on your wedding day with your flowers?????

knock on wood I have a wedding this Saturday.: ( Jinx! just kidding universe....

We finally made it to the Hillsborough Racquet Club in Hillsborough California where we would be setting up a second reception for the friends and family of the bride and groom. We had a combination of high and low centerpiece. I used local seasonal flowers for the low centerpieces which included the gorgeous hot pink dahlias, some magenta phalaenopsis, super green roses hot lady roses, some fuchia stock, some lime and fuschia cockscomb, a bit of the hot pink vanda orchids and few pieces of myrtle. They sat low on the tables in a ti leaf wrapped glass cylinder vase to match the taller centerpiece.


Now I don't know where you live, but in the San Francisco flower market there was a shortage of cut Phalaenopsis Orchid stems. Normally they are everywhere and they are readily available, but the week of this particular wedding there was a shortage and NO ONE was able to fill orders for the magenta phals. My own guy who's always has them called me Monday(5 days before the wedding) and apologized that for the first time in years he was not able to fill it. They said the greenhouses were out and that I might have to buy plants at 12-16 per stem. Umm...$15 x's 20 stems =$300 x's 7 centerpeices wholesale???
No way.
Sure enough I walked around in circles and asked everyone and finally brokered(read:begged) a deal with a guy in the market that had 9 bunches left and promised to get me 15 more in the next few days. I trusted him and showed up in two days to these lovely ladies.

Not uniform in color but hey, they were all mine! He explained that he had the most difficult time filling this order and when they finally came in he had a hard time saying no to people who were willing to pay him TRIPLE what I had paid him.
All because the greenhouses were depleted.
So we made it but let me tell you it was scary...

The taller centerpiece were tall 30 inch cylinder vases that were filled with dendrobium orchids submerged in water and bunches of phalaenopsis stems in pinks, magenta's, and a variegated pink and fuchsia.

These were spread around the room and in that white room they really popped!
I wish I had better photos but I have not been able to get my camera to properly work for me and my photoshop is also compressing my pictures down. Sorry!

This was a 16 foot garland that was draped along the edge of the HUMONGOUS fireplace.

Outside of the venue there were these cool horse heads that greet you as you walk up the stairs to the reception area so we decorated this area with two simple hand held bouquets that we secured to the horse mouth using the navy blue satin ribbon.

The stairs were lined up with simple cylinder vases with gorgeous dahlia heads in deep burgundy, magenta, fuchsia, and hot pink.


Ok I saved the best for last.
The dessert table that made me stop in my tracks and say to the gals setting up
Goddamn that's a great spread!
The cake? So cute I wanted to scream. Something told me this might go over well so instead I snapped pictures to share. Check out the orchids on this cake! I gave them a few blossoms of the dendrobiums, the vandas, and the phalaenopsis and they did there thang!

The cake stand and decor werein the wedding colors of Raspberry and Navy Blue of course and would ya look at the tiers on that cupcake holder? The polka dot ribbon, the cheesecake pops, the f*&^ing caramel apple bites????stop it! I was so jealous.

But no time to relax just yet we had to make it back to the other reception to move stuff around.

Except the car wouldn't start again. :(
I was so stressed I jumped into one of the other SUV's we brought with one of my assistants and I left two other members of my crew to deal with whatever was going on with my Pacifica...(nodding head)all bad.
But luckily I was able to reach the DOC by phone, she moved some stuff for us and we got there in time to snag one picture of the wedding party and double check the centerpieces in the main reception room.

As we were leaving the reception, the rest of my crew was pulling up and were literally jumping out of the car to attack the centerpieces, but we told them that everything was already done and it was time to go. :) They sure are awesome. Allison, Mary and Debbie~you rock! :D

So my couple went on their honeymoon and I wish them the best of luck! The wedding(s) were beautiful! I wish you much love and success in your marriage, thank you for letting me be a part of it.

{They lived happily ever after...}

Love/Hate

Love working with flowers. :)
Hate waking up at the butt crack of dawn on event days. :(

Love making flowers come together and having people oooh and ahhh...:D
Hate washing buckets after the event is over.:(

*love* delivering bridal bouquets. :)
*hate*the feeling that there is not enough time to set up an event even though most times there's plenty, it's just that I'm a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to the tables, so I feel like I'm running all over the place to get it tight.. :(

*love* my life right now. :)
*hate* that I feel so busy right now!!!!

I need to slow down and smell the sunflowers.
yes, I know they don't smell but they are my fave and they make me happy so just role with my metaphor. :)

Can someone give me a blog budge when I haven't posted in like a week? I'm getting so behind with flowers, events, mock ups, school, homework, and *GULP* high school shopping for my 13 year old.....that is the scariest right now..... Seriously though, I need to get back on my blog game and visit other parts of the web for inspiration because I think it's important to be up on what's out there ya know?

Anyhow, let me give you a peek at the backed up pictures I have that I hope to post soon.

A Raspberry and Navy Blue Wedding

The tall centerpiece were Phalaenopsis Orchids on top of 30 inch cylinder vases.

Pink, Fuchsia, and Burgundy Dahlia Bouquet for a pink, silver, and black wedding.

Yellow sunflower and green centerpiece with wooden "vases" for an outdoor wedding.

Thanks for stopping by!
I'll be posting soon :)

Pink Wedding in a Green Room

Green Room you ask? Yes. The color is...ummmm...an interesting color green. Loved by some, loathed by most. It is what I loving call a retro puke green color. I love the layout of the room, the high ceiling the chandeliers, the view, my God, the view. The color ,however, is a color that you have to work with. When my Hot Pink bride came and inquired about services in the Green Room in San Francisco of course I made myself available. I have wanted to work this venue for quite some time and I was happy to be able to provide color via the flowers to the room.
The Green Room in San Francisco is in the Veterans Building right in back of City Hall. It was originally designed as a lounge for WW1 veterans but now it's used for special events, performances weddings and the occasional photo shoot.
My daughter has her spring concert there every year because the room is right across the hall from the Hearbst Theatre.

Anyhow, when my Hot Pink Bride {who was almost my multicolored bride or actually my Polychromatic a.k.a. Pollyanna Bride} contacted me I was delighted to work with her!
She knew her flowers and as a matter of fact I believe she was trying to DIY her flowers, but realized about 4 weeks before the wedding that was out of the question.

I have had a lot of brides contact me for help on this and for last minute wedding orders because the idea of this seems doable at the time but as the wedding approaches they see that it will be hard to nearly impossible for them to get the look they want and still be sane by the wedding date. It can be done, since I did my own wedding flowers, but ask me again if I would ever do it.
HA!
I have a picture of me in full makeup with my veil on and sweats, WIRING my husbands boutonniere.
I will just fly SPROUT or JANET over here to arrange my flowers for me.{wink}

Ok, sorry for the rants....

{Hot Pink Bride}

Here is the brides and the MOH bouquet.
The bride knew she wanted to brighten up the room and wanted to have flowers that were
really pink with touches of fuchsia and pops of lime.
I used pink esperance roses, bright pink spray roses, hypericum berries, green cymbidiums, Jade roses, and gloriosa lilies.

The grooms boutonniere was matching green cymbidium, hypericum berries,
and pink spray rose.
I delivered these to the groom while my crew went to the Green Room around the corner form the hotel and I must say, this was the calmest groom I have ever seen. Usually there is nervous excitement or chatter or they say they are ok but they keep asking questions or fidgeting, but he was so cool.

The corsages and boutonnieres were simple.
She wanted them bright and colorful so we chose the magenta dendrobiums with green hypericum a simple ribbon loop on the side.


The drive to the venue was short and sweet. I could literally see it from where i was parked to unload the personal flowers. San Francisco's City hall is so beautiful to me. No matter how many times I drive by, especially at night when all the lights are on, I am always in love with this building.

Here is a shot of the Green Room with the chivari chairs lined up ready for the aisle.
The aisle is pretty wide because the tall centerpiece would be placed in the aisle to mark the front, last and middle rows in the pews. Later they would be moved to the high centerpiece.

The chandeliers are my favorite in this room.
I love the crown molding.

So are ya checking out the color of the room? Its like an old pale green with gold accents?

Here is the crew setting up the amber up lights.
The room definitely needed the burst of color. To give it energy, like ADIZAT, said. hehe

The weather and the view were stunning that day.

The centerpiece were tall arrangements in 26 inch tapered vases composed of dahlias in four colors, roses in three shades of hot pink, Jade rose, bells of Ireland, lime spider mums, and some lime kermit mums.

The inside of the tapered vase was a simple design of pink dahlias and spray roses.

The low centerpiece were arranged in a mint julep cup and the dahlias were just so big and juicy it didn't take that many to fill out a nice 10 inch diameter.
Here I used pink dahlias, mauve dahlias, cheery o roses, jade roses, shocking versilias, esperance roses, some dendrobium and cymbidums, pink hydrangeas, kermit mums, and a bit of the bells of Ireland.

We placed a small arrangement at the guest check in table and look at how cute they are with all their pictures.

The tall ceremony sprays were placed at the head of the aisle on two chocolate linen tables.

The third centerpiece were floating dahlias in water with a little bit of the glass rocks provided by the couple.
We were supposed to have three sets of centerpiece but when we arrived on site we learned that the cocktail tables needed arrangements and one of the larger glass bowls was accidentally broken so we ended up using the extra cylinder vases that were on hand and these fishbowls to create 8 extra pieces. Thank God I always bring an extra bucket of Flowers with me for these instances.

These were the cocktail table centerpiece we placed on the outside area
.
The couple had the most darling pictures of themselves as children at every table and these were the perfect size for the tables out there.

How cute right? They had soooo many pictures of themselves at different stages of their childhood and I thought that these two were very much loved by their families as they grew up. I spoke with the grooms mother the morning of the wedding as I delivered the personal flowers and expressed my thoughts on how sweet the bride was and she just lit up and agreed she was the perfect addition to their family. :) *sigh* I love weddings!

So the happy couple are on their Honeymoon now and I can't wait to see the pro pics by Lisa+James photography.

{And they lived happily ever after.....}

Silver and White Phalaenopsis Wedding {The set up}

If you live in San Francisco, 70 degrees is what we consider a really nice day, 75 is "hot". So imagine our surprise when today the weather was 83?!??!? OMG. It was waaaay too hot for me! I was DYING.
Yesterday in Rohnert Park it was 90.
90.
I was working so hard I hardly noticed until we left and sure enough as we hit the Golden Gate Bridge it was down to 53 degrees. Crazy.
Anyhow, just had to get that out of my system, lol. :P

Unfortuantely I don't have quite as many pictures as I normally do of the set up or the ceremnoy, or the wedding because my camera broke(I will be sans camera for 3 weeks! What will I do with myself?) and the chip I used had the smallest capacity in the world, so bear with me.


{Silver Wedding}

I met my Phalaenopsis bride in a far far away land called Weddingbee.com.
She seemed really nice, so I gave her some tips on DIY florals and then she delighted me by asking if I would be available to do her floral work, to which I replied demurely:
Hell yes!
So we went back and forth and then one day she asked about the beautiful Phalaenopsis Orchid and we started to create her wedding flowers around this moth orchid as some people call it. I like butterfly personally, but anyhow, she wanted a green hydrangea bouquet with white orchids for her bouquets as well as the brides maids.

Here is the Bridesmaids bouquet, it was smaller than the bridal bouquet and it was ribbon wrapped with left over fabric from their bridesmaids dresses. The biggest most beautiful green hydrangeas came in from Columbia so it only took 2 large heads to make the bridesmaids bouquets. The Phalaenopsis orchids were individually wired in.

It was so incredibly scenic out there. I mean I'm not kidding you! Look at this picture.

Here I am taking shot of the ribbon collar on the bouquet and there's a duck just taking in the view in the background, hehe. I couldn't have staged it better.

The flower girl would carry this green hydrangea pomander down the aisle. I decided to add in orchids to this pomander to match the wedding party and I accented with a silver ribbon handle and a simple tie at the base. I could have gone all cute with a ribbon but the orchids are the stars of this pomander thank you.

We arrived to the location which was Foxtail Golf Club in Rohnert Park and started to set up the centerpiece. I blogged about them earlier this month here and once constructed we set up 19 tables. The centerpiece was a potted Orchid with hydrangea at the base of the centerpiece, the white pots were ribbon wrapped with
silver satin and they were placed on a moss mat adorned with a single phalaenopsis flower.

I had extra orchids that weren't used and so I gave one to the banquet manager to wear in her hair. Pretty cool, huh? Pretty soon all the other gals working the event had orchids in their hair!

Here is the shot of one of the boutonnieres. Simple phalaenopsis orchid with a green hydrangea floret and bouillon wire around the stem.

Here is a shot of the corsages. Double bloom orchids with a little fern, some silver decorative jewelry and a silver satin bow.

Then it was onto the gazebo. Here we just decorated the top of the archway with a floral spary that consisted of pittosporum, lemon leaf, dendrobium orchids, chrysanthemums, stock, amaranthus and alstromeria.

Then just when I thought it was time to go home, the groom me and asked me about the cake.

To which I replied, huh???? Ok, so I was more eloquent than that but in my head I was like HUH?

Turns out the cake person left and didn't decorate the cake. No one saw them come in and set up and no one was there to call me or even the couple.
I was asked to decorate the cake and here is what it looked like.

I didn't have a picture or anything, I just knew she needed a certain amount of hydrangeas and orchids so I did the best I could!

Then it was time to leave and I left the couple and from the parking lot I stopped to watch her walk down the aisle. She actually ran down the aisle, I bet when she sees the video she will know she was running to her man!!! Too cute, she was all smiles ans she looked lovely.
Cool as a cucumber in that heat I tell ya.

Thanks for letting me be a part of your wedding J & B, much love and happiness to you both!