The lovely Carlie and her now husband Toby tied the knot on 4^thAugust 2019 at the quaint church of St Nicholas in Whitchurch Village, Bristol with a reception to follow in a marquee located nearby in a Bristol field. The newlyweds chose Isabloom Floral Design to be their chosen wedding florist on their wedding day.

I first met with Carlie back in January 2019 when we discussed her initial ideas on the wedding flowers she might like. Carlie’s mum and sister also joined us to offer some advice. Carlie was not sure on the types of flowers she wanted and also the names of flowers, which is often the case with brides to be. Carlie had a clear colour scheme in her mind knowing her bridesmaids were going to be wearing a blush pink / rose gold colour and there would be a lot of gold decorations throughout the reception. Carlie was also quite set on the fact that she wanted a lot of greenery within the flowers. After colours we spoke of themes and styles. Carlie and Toby wanted their church and marquee wedding to be relaxed and natural with a hint of rustic but no set theme. I wanted to ensure this was being reflected in the flowers.

After looking through some seasonal flowers together Carlie decided she would like to include within her wedding flowers; roses, peonies, wax flower, dahlias, veronicas, astrantia and lots of greenery to include scented populus eucalyptus. The flowers would be in ivory, blush pink and café au lait.

For the bouquets Carlie originally wanted a naturally shaped bouquet, nothing too classic or rounded with a slight waterfall using a combination of the selected flowers. Carlie’s bouquet was going to be slightly oversized and then the six bridesmaids would have smaller and simpler versions with roses, wax flower and eucalyptus. The bridesmaid’s bouquets would be in ivory finished off with greenery whereas, Carlie would also have a touch of the pinky tones in her bridal bouquet to match her bridesmaids. Carlie also had two flower girls which would have pretty posies of ivory wax flower with trailing ribbons and wax flower in their hair.

The grooms party of eight would have a wild style to their buttonholes with just smaller blooms; veronicas, astrantia and wax flower along with greenery. Toby; the groom would have an ivory rose in his to differentiate. The groom and his party were set to wear a royal blue colour with blush pink ties to match the bridesmaids.

On to the décor… firstly, the church ceremony. Carlie wanted to have pew ends in the church to line the aisle. Now that we had decided on the flowers, colours and style everything would follow suit. Pretty posies would decorate every other row on each side of the aisle in the church with trailing ribbons along with two milk churn displays outside the church doors. Before the wedding I was able to source two beautiful milk churns in a natural beige colour as Carlie didn’t want the usual silver colouring due to her gold theme.

I couldn’t wait to decorate them with dancing dahlias and delphiniums.

It was then on to the reception décor. The milk churns would be moved from the church doors to the marquee entrance. Carlie knew she wanted a hoop for the top table saying ‘just married’ to go on to the front of the table in the centre and that this would be decorated with greenery. Carlie wasn’t sure if this would be enough for the op table or what else she could have to decorate it. I suggested that we create a garland that almost grew out of the hoop with some flowers scattered through. We really liked this idea after looking at some imagery together and decided to create a natural garland of eucalyptus and ruscus along the length of the table with tiny hidden jars holding some flowers throughout. The whole arrangement would be plastic and foam free. Two large jars would then be filled with floral arrangements and placed at each end of the table creating a real floral show stopper. There were going to be nine round tables of guests and Carlie was not sure at this point what the centre pieces were going to be so we discussed jam jars and small vases of flower arrangements and that we would decide on this at our final meeting later in the year.

As long as the main things are in place after the initial consultation there is plenty of scope to play around with flower types, colours, vases etc. up until 8 weeks before the wedding.

Following our meeting a detailed quote was sent over to Carlie and Toby which they looked over together and were happy with. They paid their 10% deposit to secure their wedding date and would not need to pay the remainder until 8 weeks before the wedding.

Myself and Carlie kept in touch in the following months. Carlie would ask me for some advice on certain things, Toby ordered some flowers for Carlie along the way and we arranged our final meeting in June 2019.

During our final meeting everything was pretty much the same as what we had discussed back in January apart from the bridal bouquet. Carlie had discovered proteas from my Instagram and had researched some bridal bouquets with protea in. I think she fell slightly in love with them (it is hard not to) and requested to have some in her bridal bouquet. I explained the size of them and as Carlie is quite petitie we decided on one feature protea in the bouquet as it was the large headed ones that she liked. It would be in blush pink. This made me even more excited to design her bridal bouquet as it is a favourite of mine. Carlie and Toby had now also decided that they wanted one small glass vase of flowers in the centre of each round table which would be placed on a log with some other bits and the table wine. Carlie also added on the table plan. She had ordered a wooden box online and would add sticks into it at different levels which would have the table plans stuck on. This would then be filled with flowers. Two ‘thank you’ bouquets for each mum were also requested to be delivered the day after the wedding. Wedding ‘thank you’ bouquets always reflect the wedding flowers unless requested otherwise.

One week before the wedding I placed the order for the wedding flower collection and they arrived on the Thursday before. Along with the help of my amazing mum I spent the day conditioning the flowers and separating them out for different things. Early on the Friday the real preparation began with vases being filled, foliage being wired together and button holes and bouquets being created along with much more! On the morning of the wedding the set up began at the marquee with jobs such as vases being placed on tables, the top table being decorated. It was then on to the church to tie on the pue ends and deliver the buttonholes then finally on to the brides house to deliver all of the bouquets.

It was a pleasure to be a part of Carlie and Toby’s special day and I wish them all of the best in the future. Thank you for choosing Isabloom Floral Design.