Selecting your wedding bouquet is a delightful part of crafting your bridal ensemble. From selecting flowers for their significance to exploring colours and textures, there’s much to consider to ensure your bouquet harmonizes with your dress and wedding theme. This article will tackle the factors to consider when selecting your floral arrangement with these eight wedding bouquet tips.
Factors to Consider When Selecting Your Wedding Bouquet:
Dress Style: Ensure your bouquet style complements rather than overwhelms your dress.
Season: Opting for flowers in season is sustainable and can be more budget-friendly.
Theme: Consider how your bouquet fits into the overall aesthetic, considering factors like texture, colour, and size, which are influenced by your wedding style, venue, and season.
Weight: Ensure you and your bridal party can comfortably carry the bouquet throughout the day.
Allergies: Inform your florist of any allergies to ensure suitable flower choices.
Which style will gracefully accompany you down the aisle?
However, one aspect often overlooked is the shape, which is equally crucial when collaborating with your florist. Whether you’re unfamiliar with terms like nosegays or shower bouquets, we’re here to introduce you to the diverse array of wedding bouquet shapes and styles available for you and your bridal party.”
This approach is refreshingly straightforward yet remarkably effective, as it can elevate your wedding bouquet to its fullest potential. But where should you begin? Should you select a few favourite blooms and let your floral designer work their magic based on your choices? Or should you reverse-engineer the process, drawing inspiration from major floral elements like centrepieces or flower walls? While both of these approaches are perfectly valid, we’d like to introduce another method: Start by choosing the shape of your bouquet. Why? Selecting a shape requires considering critical details about your big day: Your wedding dress silhouette (to ensure harmony between your gown and bouquet) and overall wedding style.
Different bouquet shapes evoke different wedding vibes. For instance, a round bouquet exudes classic elegance, while a crescent shape (as showcased in the Wild Green Yonder beauty seen here) or a dramatic cascade of blooms lends a boho-chic flair. By selecting the proper shape, you can set the tone for your bouquet and enhance the overall aesthetic of your wedding day.
8 Wedding Bouquet Tips:
Bouquet Shapes
Circular Bouquet
Exuding fullness and elegance, the circular bouquet is a timeless choice that perfectly complements a classic bridal look. Ideal for pairing with a princess ball gown or achieving a formal wedding party aesthetic, this style typically features a mix of floral varieties. However, it also shines with a single flower type, like roses. There are no gaps with short stems and tightly arranged blooms, creating a cohesive look bound together with a ribbon.
A round bouquet should evoke a voluminous ball of blooms, with its 360-degree construction eliminating the need for a designated front or back. If you’re contemplating this timeless style, remember that “utilizing just one type of flower can be incredibly impactful,” suggests Ahn.
Posy & Nosegay Bouquet
Posy bouquets and nosegay bouquets share similarities as both are compact, hand-tied bunches. However, there’s a subtle distinction: posies typically feature only flowers, whereas nosegays may include glimpses of greenery. Perfect for delicate arrangements, tiny blooms such as gypsophila (baby’s breath), lavender, and many Irish wildflowers excel in this style. Yet, with the right balance, petite posies can be crafted using almost any flower.
Pro Tip: Designed to be held with ease in one hand, these bouquets are ideal in size and style for bridesmaids and flower girls, serving as charming counterparts to the central bridal bouquet. Additionally, they’re a smart option for navigating a wedding dress with intricate details or a cumbersome design.
Handheld Bouquet
Embodying a relaxed charm reminiscent of freshly gathered blooms, the hand-tied bouquet exudes an effortless vibe. With a potentially broad silhouette, flowers are arranged at varying heights, often accompanied by abundant greenery to enhance its organic appeal. This style is excellent for cultivating a laid-back atmosphere, particularly suited for boho or rustic-themed weddings.
Pro Tip: Enhance this wedding bouquet style by tying it off with vibrant trailing ribbons or textured twine for an added touch of charm and personality.
Garden-Inspired Bouquet
Like the hand-tied bouquet, this style exudes a delightful sense of freedom and romance with its loose, free-form shape. Typically featuring larger blooms such as peonies, dahlias, or garden roses as the focal point, it is complemented by smaller flowers, lush foliage, and branches, evoking the organic beauty found in a garden setting, just as nature intended.
Long-Stemmed Bouquet
Long-stemmed bouquets, renowned for their graceful elegance, match the timeless beauty of roses. What sets them apart is the deliberate choice to retain the length of the stems, a departure from the common practice of trimming them shorter. Wedding florists craft a bouquet that exudes sophistication and sleekness by leaving the stems long and free of foliage. Its design speaks volumes with its simplicity yet carries a subtle touch of drama, making it an ideal choice for the discerning minimalist bride.
The elongated stems of the roses not only lend an air of refinement but also serve to elongate the overall silhouette of the bouquet, creating a visually striking effect. Against the backdrop of a bride’s attire, whether a modern sheath dress or a chic pantsuit, this bouquet style adds a captivating focal point that effortlessly complements the clean lines and understated elegance of minimalist bridal fashion.
Moreover, the choice of roses, symbolic significance of love and beauty, adds depth to the bouquet’s aesthetic appeal. Their classic allure transcends trends, ensuring the bouquet remains timeless and eternally stylish. Whether in a monochromatic palette of pristine whites or a romantic medley of blush tones, the long-stemmed bouquet elevates the bridal ensemble with its refined simplicity.
As the bride gracefully carries this bouquet down the aisle, its elongated form creates a sense of fluidity and movement, enhancing the overall aura of sophistication and grace. It becomes not just an accessory but a statement piece that reflects the bride’s discerning taste and understated elegance.
In essence, the long-stemmed bouquet is a testament to the beauty found in simplicity. Its clean lines and unadorned elegance make it a timeless choice that transcends fleeting trends. For the minimalist bride seeking sophistication without excess, this bouquet is the epitome of refined beauty, a symbol of love and grace that will be treasured for years.
Expert Tip: Elevate your bouquet’s elegance by requesting your florist to adorn the handle with a luxurious silk ribbon, adding extra glamour to your bridal ensemble.
Cascade Bouquet
Also known as shower, overflowing, or waterfall wedding bouquets, cascading bouquets are the epitome of statement floral arrangements. True to their name, the blooms cascade gracefully over and down the holder’s hands, creating a stunning visual effect. This bouquet style is unifying, particularly when incorporating abundant vines and foliage into your other floral arrangements. Mermaid and trumpet gowns perfectly complement this bouquet style, accentuating the distinctive flow of these dress silhouettes and enhancing the overall bridal aesthetic.
Cascades come in various lengths and fullness, typically thriving in a more organic style, adorned with trailing, vine-like greenery,” remarks Ahn. She suggests incorporating orchids, given their inherent cascading nature. However, Rico emphasizes the options available, ranging from peonies, hollyhocks, Japanese anemones, and clematis to sandersonia, scabiosa, poppies, lupines, foxgloves, and fritillarias. “The bouquet offers a versatile appearance from every angle and can be held in numerous ways,” she adds. “Moreover, diverse blooms allow for intricate detailing and blending of colours, resulting in a truly stunning and multifaceted arrangement.”
Pro Tip: Remember that cascading bouquets can become quite heavy due to the abundance of stems needed to achieve the desired shape.
Whimsical Bouquet
Free-form bouquets, also oversized bridal bouquets, boast a generous size and are crafted in an airy, whimsical manner. Their allure lies in their ability to cascade in various directions – upwards, downwards, and outwards – creating a captivating visual display. Explore an abundance of oversized floral inspiration here for more ideas on this enchanting style.
Pageant & Presentation Bouquet
Ideal for brides who cherish the elegance of elongated stems and seek a bouquet with a particularly romantic flair, pageant bouquets are enchanting. These lovely arrangements exude a classic, vintage charm with their delicate form and elongated lines. When held gracefully over the arm, they add a timeless elegance to your ensemble and capture beautifully in photos, evoking a sense of grace and sophistication.
Carry this bouquet shape precisely as its name suggests—nestled in the crook of your arm, akin to being crowned a pageant queen. The contemporary design is intended to make a bold statement. Opt for striking blooms such as orchids, gloriosa lilies, peonies, or dahlias if you opt for a pageant bouquet to accompany you down the aisle.
Conclusion:
Surprisingly, your wedding bouquet plays a crucial role on your special day. With its rich tradition dating back centuries, it not only adds the finishing touch to your ensemble but also complements the overall floral theme of your event. Essentially, it serves as a symbol of your significance as the bride while seamlessly integrating you into the decor of your wedding day. Selecting your bridal bouquet thus becomes one of the significant floral decisions in your planning journey.
