diy flowers ?

My mum is a florist (hates doing weddings though!) so she often supplies people with the flowers to arrange as they wish.

If you go down this route, you will benefit from a later ceremony time as setting up, getting hair/make up done and generally getting prepared is stressful enough without having to be up at the crack of dawn and racing around making sure it looks right. This does depend on your venue and wedding date, but many venues have problems with people setting up the day before the wedding - usually this isn’t because they are a popular venue and have weddings most day’s, but you do get the odd place that gets funny for other, unknown reasons.

Part of the price of a florist is the flower quality, which is much higher than supermarket quality. Another part is their experience and capabilities with flowers. Another part is that they deal with the stress of preparing and setting up. (Then there’s usually a fourth part to the price which is the usual “wedding surplus”.) Not all florists will be excessively priced, so maybe keep looking?

Purely out of curiosity, what flowers etc. we’re you thinking of?

Hey! We decided to do our own flowers for the ceremony, table centres, place settings and marquee, but we are using flowers from various gardens so don’t need to worry about sourcing them (other than the wedding wrecking them!) and setting them up the day before. Our caterers will be putting them out for us in the morning, so we’ll just get someone to check them before the day starts. We looked at getting them wholesale from flower markets (cutting out the florists altogether) but it was too far away to transport home, and we wanted something quite simple. We’ve got a florist doing the bouquets and the buttonholes as we decided those were too complicated/time consuming, so wanted to avoid the stress! Wedding isn’t till September, so we’ll have to wait and see how it turns out...

I am having dried flowers for bouquets and buttonholes, largely because the wild flowers look I want to go for is not really in season in February.


I do want some real flowers, so I am looking at a combination of supermarket and letterbox flowers for some very simple table decorations. Another option is a trip to New Covent Garden Market if it opens to the public again. Looking at online wholesalers, they seem to have very high minimum orders, which is fine if you want lots of the same flowers, but not so great if you are after more of a combination. I may got for an absolute tonne of camomile and gypsophila, so the online wholesaler may work for that.

View quoted message

Could I ask why your mum hates doing wedding flowers.

View quoted message

I believe it’s a combination of things that have accumulated over the years - she didn’t always feel like this! I think the main factors have been one too many bridezillas being unreasonable combined with her own personal high standards. She knows that flowers can have a huge impact on the appearance and mood of a room and she always wants to get it just right! That’s caused her a lot of stress, especially when weddings are considered such an important day for the bride and groom!

I am sure there are other things that have contributed to her feelings, but those are probably the main ones. She still does weddings but she doesn’t advertise specially for them, she gets plenty without advertising.

View quoted message

I am really sorry but I have to confess that I had a hidden agenda and somewhat lured you into a trap.

It was this comment "(Then there’s usually a fourth part to the price which is the usual “wedding surplus”.)"

Your reply then giving some of the reasoning why your mum does not like doing weddings go's a long way to explain the reason for the "wedding Surplus". Also the consequences if a supplier messes up. So a supplier - if they are professional needs to have in-place so much more in the way of procedures, best practice, backup, insurance which all costs extra which is then passed onto the couple.

I would say that if a supplier sounds cheap then there could be corners that are being cut.

Hope that didn't sound like a rant and helps explain to the OP why wedding flowers cost what they do.

View quoted message

You know what, you're absolutely right about the reason for the wedding surplus and it is a point that needs to be made!! People always complain about it, but frankly if you have never worked within a job that caters for weddings, you don't know the stresses that go with it.

(I have no objection to you using my comments to make a point! Point well made, sir!)

View quoted message

Fewwwww !

I was so nervous of "going there " with the wedding surplus or the "W" word adding ££ because I have seen it kick off on this forum over the years.

View quoted message We’re doing the exact same thing. Florist to do the more complicated things but then we’re doing the tables, centre pieces, ceremony aisle etc.


Our plan is getting flowers from flower farms but as we don’t know if our wedding is going ahead, we’ve not yet confirmed our supplier.
I’m not worried though as if we aren’t source from the flower farms, we’re ordering from Triangle Nursery which source from the Netherlands but then ships to you. I’ve ordered some of their DIY boxes for Christmas and the whole process was simple so I’m not too stressed.

The flowers in the church were DIY for our wedding and we just paid a professional to do my bouquet and my OHs buttonhole. Because the whole look was quite informal and cottage garden style, it worked well together.

If you go for a fairly simple, rustic look, you should be able to put something together the day before with home grown or supermarket flowers and even if you can't set up the night before, get a friend to do it first thing in the morning. But if you want something more complex, you really need to hire a professional.

I'm doing my own, only having flowers for my bouquet though so going to get some the day before and put some nice lace around them. I only want tulips anyway as they are my favourite so nothing complicated

DIY wedding flowers are a great way to add a personal touch to your big day. With a little bit of creativity and some basic flower-arranging skills, you can create beautiful bouquets, centerpieces, and other floral decorations that will complement your wedding theme and style.

One of the best things about DIY wedding flowers is that they can be customized to your liking. Whether you prefer a classic and elegant look or a more modern and bohemian vibe, you can choose the flowers, colors, and arrangements that best suit your taste.