Lyndsay and Pete's Cooling Castle Barn wedding

We've seen a lot of couples for consultations in the past couple of weeks, and the most favourite wedding at present seems to be Lyndsay and Pete's Cooling Castle Barn wedding.  It really is providing inspiration for quite a few people so we thought we'd share it with you.  It will end up being a wedding of the month on the website, but here are a few photos in the meantime.

Firstly, I know I'm not allowed to favour one bouquet over another, but I really do love Lyndsay's bouquet...so spriggy, blowsy, soft and I love the touch of blue from the muscari.  Added to the lace was a beuatiful heirloom marcasite flower brooch.

For Lyndsay's bridesmaids, we decided to provide smaller versions on Lyndsay's bouquet without the muscari.  We added a small and pretty pin to their stems to tie in with Lyndsay.

For the three Flower Girls, we designed a pretty circlet of flowers for them using the flowers in the bouquets.  I'm sure they looked gorgeous in the them, but in the meantime we decided that they would be well modelled by our owl!

Pete wore a Maroussia rose buttonholes with muscari, chincherinchee, rosemary and eucalyptus whilst the remainder of the boys had very similar buttonholes with the rose replaced by a ranunculus.  Mums and Grans had corsages to tie in with the wedding, yet be tailored to their specific outfits.

For the ceremony, we dressed the dais at Cooling with ivory organza and added roses through the bows.  We then placed a large pedestal arrangement on a decorative tower onto the centre of the dais and a soft and pretty, long and low arrangement onto the celebrant table.  To perfectly frame Lyndsay as she walked down the aisle, we provided aisle candlesticks dressed with soft arrangements of flowers and organza bows.

For the reception, we provided a long and low arrangement on the top table, and finished the napkins with roses.  We added empty vases at each end to take the bouquets, which added to the look and feel, and kept the flowers fresher for longer...bonus!

Each of the guest tables was dressed with a tall elegant chrome candelabra with softly flickering battery operated candles.  The top of each was dressed with a full and flowing arrangement of roses, lilac, chincherinchee, trachellium, anenomes, hydrangeas, shamrock style blooms, ranunculus and guelder rose.  Ivy trailed gently down the stems.   So pretty!

The finishing touches were all carefull thought out by Lyndsay with Your Beautiful Day dressing the chairs with cameo style brooches (Pete proposed with a cameo ring, hence it was very special) and included this on all their elegant stationery and tableplan.  Shelly's Cakes then finished everything off with a gorgeous stacked cameo inspired cake.  We also provided confetti for the cones provided by Lyndsay and dressed with the very important cameos.

It was such a well planned and designed wedding and we loved it.  Thankfully so did Lyndsay and Pete who are now back down to earth after a Mexican honeymoon...how fab!

Valentine's Day

Just a quick blog to say Happy Valentine's Day to everyone for later in the week.  We won't be rushed off our feet and working through the night on rose bouquets this year (Oh how we remember those days!) as we've decided not to buy any roses this week.  Yes, a florist who doesn't deliver red roses on Valentine's Day...I've always been different!  We've decided that as we don't have a shop front anymore and don't rely on day to day deliveries for our business, we're leaving this to other florists and saving ourselves having to explain why roses are so expensive at the moment.  Sorry if anyone is upset by this but there are lots and lots of other florists that would love to help.

In the meantime, we hope you like our large button heart canvas...made just for fun and to coordinate with a champagne, metallic and black bedroom.  Enjoy!

Haven and Tom's wedding vow renewal at Cooling Castle Barn

We always love to meet our wedding couples before their big day...we don't like the impersonal approach of just emailing and we don't like to quote for wedding work before meeting our couples, but sometimes it is necessary to start this way.  We met Debbie (Tom's Mum) at a couple of wedding fairs as she was given the unenviable job of starting the wedding planning for Haven and Tom who were based in Texas at the time.  They had married in the US in a quiet ceremony and were therefore renewing their vows here in the UK as soon as they could.  We spent time initially talking to Debbie and sending her emails and photos for her to discuss and pass onto Haven and then pass her answers back.  It might sound cumbersome, but I think it worked pretty well as we then met Haven and Tom when they arrived in the UK and their wedding was complete in the snow in January of this year....a lovely rustic, personal mix of US and UK with lots of lovely spring flowers.

Haven had brought the most gorgeous tiered gown with her from Texas and was set to wear it with her cowboy boots (a Texan tradition).  She was going to look so glamorous and yet we wanted to keep things pretty rustic and hence decided on a textured hand-tied bouquet of ranunculus, muscari, hypericum, pussy willow, paperwhites, chincherinchee, spray roses, gypsophilia and snowy birch.  We wrapped the bouquet to match her dress and added the ribbon that had been used on the invitations along with a slightly vintage pearl pin. 

Haven had a single Flower Girl, and had chosen a heart shaped wire basket which we dressed with flowers, added blue biodegradable petals and ribbon.

For the boys we decided on a re ranunculus with ivory berries and pussy willow for Tom, and an ivory ranunculus with red berries and pussy willow for the rest of the boys.  Corsages were also provided for the ladies.

For the celebrant table, we provided a natural low and long arrangement using all the flowers used elsewhere and using birch and snowy birch to keep the rustic look.

For the reception tables, we looked at a range of different options but finally decided upon tall pitchers which were personalised and which included an advice tree...basically guests were given small cards in envelopes on which to write advice and pin them onto the branches.  We used a range of different branches, some with subtle sparkle to ensure the right look, but also the holding power required.  We then added flowers around the base of the branches.  We also added a couple of Mason jars that Haven had brought over with her from Texas filled with flowers to match elsewhere.  We weren't 100% sure how this would look in such a high ceilinged venue like Cooling, but it really did work and we got so many comments for how different it looked.

For the top table Haven and Tom had had personalised bunting made for the front of the table and we thus added a central arrangement that didn't trail forwards too much which may have covered the letters.

Haven and Tom had provided their own table plan cleverly made from chicken wire in a frame, and we dressed that to match the rest of the flowers. 

We also provided a birdcage post box for their wedding cards, which again we dressed with flowers to match.

The final finishing touch (unknown even to Debbie and Chris) was a lovely travelling vintage suitcase / trunk cake made by our friends Creative Cakes...it even had the Texan star and the Union Jack attached...how appropriate.

We know that planning the wedding was a little less standard but I think Haven and Tom had the perfect day at the end, and I know everyone had a great time.  Just goes to show that we all need to be flexible about how to work at times.