I have been delighted by, and slightly in awe of, the number of Brides-to-be I have come across recently who have expressed a desire to do their own wedding flowers. I’ve also attended some wonderful weddings where friends and family have provided blooms from their own gardens to arrange around the venue and in the table centrepieces. I thought, if a Bride is willing to give it a go on her wedding day, that I should be able to throw something together on a relaxed afternoon at home. So, we’re starting with something very simple and styling three bunches of white roses in vintage advertising tins today to create four subtely different table centrepieces – all for under £15!
What we used:
3 Bunches of White Roses
Additional Flowers from Garden
Four Tins (such as tea tins, biscuit tins etc)
Eight Books
Two Cups and Saucers
One small silver frame
Friday is market day in Chatteris, a Fenland town in North Cambridgeshire where I live. The Friday market has a wonderful flower stall which offers a fairly limited choice of blooms, but at a very good price. I was looking for gypsophilia to fill some of my silver teapots for a client consultation but they had none left. I decided instead to grab three bunches of white roses for the bargain price of £4. Now, I actually didn’t need the flowers until Monday so when I came to dress them up for my consultation they were starting to go over a little but if you pick your flowers up the day before your wedding they will still be fresh and beautiful – just keep them somewhere cool and standing in plenty of water overnight.
I chose four vintage tea tins to fill with flowers. I decided this because they are slightly smaller than teapots so the same number of blooms would go a little bit further and give me more for my money. These tins were not intended to hold water (unlike teapots) and in some cases are looking a bit rusty on the inside so I found some small jam jars which would hide snuggly inside the tins and filled them about a third full with water. Shorter, wider jam jars are perfect. As are baby food jars.
Using the glass jars instead of filling the tins will prevent any accidents with leakages onto your tables and gives a smaller, tighter base for your flower stems, making the overall finish neater. A better result could be obtained using oasis – giving you more control over the position of the flowers – but unless you have a stack of it lying around at home (I didn’t) it will add another small cost to your table centres and I wanted to keep these simple and thrifty.
If you are already considering doing your own wedding flowers then you have probably thrown some roses into a vase before. In which case, I am in danger of trying to teach a grandmother to suck eggs (whatever the hell that means). But a DIY tutorial would be incomplete without a little instruction on how to prepare your flowes.
Strip all of the leaves from the stem, being careful of the thorns. Judge the height that you need to cut your stems by holding the flower next to your jar. Shorter stems will work well around the edges, allowing them to tilt slightly to conceal the edges of the tins (and hence hide the glass jars). You will need slightly taller stems in the middle to create a slight dome and to give your arrangements some height.
Cut the stem at a 45 degree angle to allow the flower to take up as much water as possible. To keep your flowers fresher for longer, which might be useful if you are prepping the flowers the night before, ensure you cut your stems while they are submerged in water or under a running tap. This prevents too much air from entering the stem and preventing water uptake.
Arrange the flowers in the jars – I found five stems per jar to be the perfect number. Vary your heights and move the blooms around until you are happy that you can’t see the glass containers inside the tins.
I wanted to add some more colour and texture to my arrangements but without spending any more money. I attacked my flower beds to find these pretty blue forget-me-nots. Forget-me-nots self seed and will spread quickly – so much so that my garden is currently at risk of being taken over by them. However, this means they are an easy flower to grow at home if you want fresh home-grown flowers in your wedding arrangements. Forget-me-nots are notoriously delicate so you will need to cut them as close to your wedding as possible – preferably on the day – as they wilt easily. Cut them off at ground level to ensure you have enough height in your arrangements.
Three or four stems of forget-me-not in each jar, nestled between the roses, is enough to inject a bit of colour. The difference in height and size of the flowers adds a great contrast to the roses. The finished displays now just need a bit of jazzing up to turn them into expensive looking tablecentres.
For the first table centrepiece we added two coordinating books. As the tin was larger than the other three and contained twice the amount of flowers we decided it didn’t need any extra paraphenalia. The total cost of this centrepiece, including flowers and hire of the tin and books from The Vintage Teacup Hire Company, is £3.00.
For the second centrepiece we used three red books, the top one being a gardening theme to match the home grown blooms and paired them with a vintage cup and saucer in a complimenting colour. The total cost of this table centrepiece, including flowers and hire of the tin, books and teacup from The Vintage Teacup Hire Company, is £4.50.
The third centrepiece is styled with two old books and a pretty teacup in a dark blue and gold theme. The total cost of this table centrepiece, including flowers and hire of the tin, books and teacup and saucer from The Vintage Teacup Hire Company is £4.00.
The final centrepiece is styled with two green books on a horticultural theme with a pretty silver frame suitable for a table number or a family photograph. The total cost of this centrepiece, including flowers and hire of the tin, books and frame from The Vintage Teacup Hire Company, is £3.00.
That is four table centrepieces with DIY flowers and styling from The Vintage Teacup Hire Company for only £14.50. That’s less than £4.00 per table! Go on, have a go and tell us how you get on!
