When you picture wedding flowers, you might imagine armfuls of freshly cut blooms, overflowing with colour and movement. This isn't difficult to achieve with fresh flowers, and much more of a challenge with dried. That's why sometimes their dried counterparts can appear rigid and stiff in comparison.
I don't believe it has to be this way...
Dried wedding flowers offer something rather different. Granted, their movement must be coaxed out in other ways, but the texture and sculptural beauty has limitless potential, and an area of dried floristry that feels new and exciting.
I've recently started creating with dried flowers for weddings, after being approached to create wedding flowers after my work was spotted in a shop window. Up until that point, wedding flowers were not really a direction I had considered taking with my work. I'd made some bridal bouquets, but had always been drawn to creating large scale work and felt like I wanted to take my work down the installation route.
Having worked closely on this particular wedding for the last few months, I've realised how they're the perfect place to not only push the boundaries of my creativity, but also to create large-scale installation pieces to decorate the ceremony and reception spaces. I really enjoyed working alongside the bride to explore colour and flower choices to fit with her vision and dream aesthetic, and found it incredibly rewarding to be playing a small part in such an important day.
Creating movement in dried flowers
I love a creative challenge and I have found myself being so captivated by the idea of creating movement using everlasting flowers. This really is what makes me tick. The drying process brings out new details that aren't visible when a flower is fresh. Ranunculus dry to the most beautiful shimmery tones, a myriad of colours come to the surface of their papery petals. Seed heads become little sculptures to add interest and depth to arrangements. Stems bend and twist, but in an entirely different way to when they're fresh.
Flowers are art! The beauty and fun in this process for me is having the opportunity to place them together, like combining colours on a canvas, or threads on a tapestry. Rather than trying to recreate a fresh flower arrangement, I like to embrace these qualities and create work that feels natural and ethereal.
Working with dried means we don't have the "bounce" that comes with a fresh flower, so the fun bit for me is how can I recreate that feeling creatively using these materials...
I think there is still a perception that dried flowers have to mean beige pampas grass and very rigid arrangements, or at the other end of the scale they have to be very bright indeed to make up for the fact they're dried.
Why choose dried flowers for a wedding?
One of the benefits is obviously the fact that dried flowers last considerably longer, meaning table flowers and bouquets can be taken home by loved ones as keepsakes, and wedding bouquets can occupy a corner of your home for many months or years to come, removing the considerable cost of preserving your fresh wedding bouquet.
Another plus is the fact that when working with everlasting flowers, it means British flowers can be used during the months of autumn, winter and early spring, where there are a lot less fresh flowers to choose from. The flowers hanging from the beams of my little farmhouse in summer can find their way into a bridal bouquet in winter...Magic!
Another important consideration is that with our weather patterns becoming more and more extreme, dried flowers take out the stress of wilting, flopping and the need for a water source. Dried flowers will stand up in the heat waves that will sadly become more and more the norm, and while they dislike rain and wind, fresh or dried, those conditions aren't really ideal!
Bouquets and arrangements can be made weeks in advance, and smaller items posted anywhere in the UK, meaning timings are not so important.
Are dried wedding flowers sustainable?
Dried flowers are all too often labelled a "sustainable choice" without much else to back it up.
You can read more about my ethos and approach to sustainability here but some of the reasons my flowers are such an earth-friendly choice is because I grow most of what I use here, using no chemicals or industrial processes.
I harvest the flowers and hang them from beams in a dark warm room in our house, each and every one of them air dried naturally, and if I need to source additional flowers or foliage I look to British growers.
I don't use dyes or bleaches to preserve their colour, and my mechanics are all reusable.
If you'd like to find out more about my dried wedding flowers, or get in touch for a no obligation quote, please visit my weddings page.