Wedding Flowers: Where to Start
If you're hosting an urban wedding like we specialize in, choosing the right flowers is essential to add vibrance and softness to your venue. Cities like Philadelphia offer historical and industrial venues that are the perfect canvas for a large or intimate wedding. But they often lack in natural elements. We've put together our guide to picking the perfect flowers for your wedding.
Pinterest is Awesome (to a point)
Find inspiration wherever you can. Pinterest is stocked with gorgeous wedding photos, indoor and out, large and small, vintage or modern. Use sites like this for inspiration, but remember yourself as well! You want your personality to come through in your wedding, including in the flowers and foliage. So take inspiration from other weddings but remember to make it your own.
Where do I need flowers?
There's where you need flowers, and there's where you want flowers. The list of types of floral decor for a wedding is almost endless. We consider the bare minimum: bouquets, centerpieces, boutonnieres. But there are also altar arrangements, aisle decorations, food station arrangements, corsages, cake table arrangements, and the list goes on.
So before you get overwhelmed with where you want flowers, determine your budget. If you invested in the venue of your dreams with a jaw-dropping view of Philly, it might be best to keep it simple. But maybe you kept your venue basic so you could make it your own.
Creating Your Floral Budget
You can break your flowers down into three groups: personal, ceremony, and reception. Personal would be any flowers held or worn by the wedding party. So think flower crowns, bouquets, boutonnieres, and so forth. Ceremony flowers would include altar arrangements, chair decorations, tossing petals, and more. Reception flowers being centerpieces, cake flowers, sweethearts' table, and more.
This is an opportunity for you to break down your budget. Decide what percentage of your floral budget should go to what portion of your event. If you're looking for lush, exotic flower crowns for your bridal crew, you can always keep the ceremony simple--or vise versa.
Working With Your Florist
Hiring a professional floral designer means getting an artist to create your vision. But there are a couple of points to keep in mind in order for you to make the most of it. For example, have some inspiration pictures ready before you meet with them. If you're not too familiar with flower names, pictures can be especially useful to communicate your ideas. We recommend having on hand a Pinterest board, pictures of your wedding venue, your dress, and swatches from your bridesmaids' dresses. Learn the names of the types of arrangements you're most interested in, and maybe a few flowers as well. All of this means communicating more detail to your florist, allowing them to deliver even better results.
Best Wedding Florist in Philadelphia
Looking for a floral pro in Philly? Check out what some of your friends have to say about our floral team:
"You guys did such a gorgeous job for our wedding!! Everything I imagined and more!! It was truly magical. Took my breath away when I walked in. I can't thank you guys enough. From the attention to detail, responsiveness and calmness of Sharon to the incredible flowers, lanterns, vases & petals spread throughout, not to mention the photo booth swing! Breath taking!! Thank you so much!! Highly recommend."
- Alexa Burke
"Just wanted to send you a special note to thank you for your hard work and creativity. The flowers for our wedding turned out more beautiful than we could have imagined. We have received so many compliments. You truly do amazing work and we are so grateful we found you! You made for an enjoyable experience and most of all stress-free! You are the best!"
- Mr. and Mrs. Vogt
“My sister used Hoffman Design for her wedding and I knew I would use them without a doubt. Sharon was absolutely incredible to work with. Her pricing is incredibly reasonable and her work is breathtaking! Sharon was responsive, flexible and professional to work with. She listened intently to our requests and delivered flawlessly. I would absolutely recommend. Thank you for everything !!”
- Kelly & Jesse
“Sharon was amazing to work with!! She was super responsive, flexible, and truly listened to our visions and helped make them come true. Our wedding flowers were better than I even imagined!”
- Jackie R.
“I worked with Sharon for my wedding and she was absolutely amazing! We told her our vision for the wedding and she made it come to life everything from the bouquets to the center pieces to the flowers for the cake were perfect! She was so easy to work with and so flexible; I changed things a lot and even close to the wedding added some additional flowers that were needed and it was no problem at all. Working with Sharon I knew it was one less thing I had to worry about on the day of because I knew everything she did would be perfect and exactly what I was looking for! Couldn't have been happier!”
- Danielle M.