DIY Wedding: How to Make a Wedding Bouquet

When you are on a tight budget for your wedding, a good way to save money is to make your own bouquets for the bride and bridesmaids. The whole process can be carried out without any professional help, and your bouquets will not look noticeably different from what a florist would have made. The following tips will help with each step of the process, from picking out a flower combination to gathering other materials and arranging the actual bouquets.

Selecting Flowers for Your Wedding Bouquets

There are a number of different kinds of flowers that you can use in wedding bouquets, and there is no way to list them all here. No discussion of wedding flowers would be complete without roses, which come in many different colors and sizes and will mix well with just about any other flower. Another of the most popular family of flowers for weddings is the lily, from elegant calla lilies to fragrant stargazer lilies. Other good options include orchids, alstroemeria, hydrangea, and less traditional blooms like sunflowers and daisies. The choices are many, and the florist you are ordering from can help you find the right types and colors of flowers.

If you are including multiple types of flowers in your bouquet, select one type of large or colorful flower that will be the focal point of the bouquet, and then choose the rest of the flowers accordingly. You won't want to pick things that compete with one another for attention, but rather flowers that complement one another and are in the same range of colors.

Also consider how the bridal and bridesmaid bouquets will relate to one another. You can either have the bridesmaid bouquets just be smaller versions of the bridal one, or work with entirely different flowers. If the bridesmaids are wearing a bright color, make sure that the flowers match it, but without blending in too much with the dress.

You will also need some greens and filler to go with the flowers in your wedding bouquet. Some good fillers include eco-palms, dusty miller, hosta, grasses, baby's breath, and Italian ruscus. Pick a range of colors that complement your flowers (if you have a dark palette, pick darker greens), so as not to be distracting. The greens should fill out the bouquet, not be focal points.

Additional Materials Needed to Make Wedding Bouquets

Once you have all your flowers, you will need some other materials to put things together. You will need a pair of scissors to trim the stems at a 45º angle so they will take up more water, and you will need vases, both to keep the flowers in between when you get them and when you use them, and also some small-neck vases to arrange your bouquets in and keep them held together so you can see what they will look like once they are tied.

To hold your wedding bouquets together, you will need some florist tape, which will be wrapped tightly around the stems. It typically comes in green, although the color won't matter because you will probably be covering it all with ribbon. Speaking of ribbon, you will want some, both to wrap around the stems, and also as part of the bouquet if you would like. Lastly, you might need some pins to secure the ribbon, unless you are tying off the ends in a bow.

How to Assemble Your Wedding Bouquets

Once you have all the pieces, assembling the wedding bouquets is simple. In a vase, start placing flowers, beginning with the focal points, and then arranging other flowers around those. You can move things around as much as you need to in the vase, trimming stems as needed to get the desired shape. Don't forget to use your greens, both around the edges and poking out from the middle if you would like.

The shape and density of your wedding bouquets can vary anywhere from a tight sphere to a loose and rustic-looking clutch. Once you have something you are happy with, have somebody hold the stems together and pull it out of the vase. Wrap florist tape around the stems until they are tightly secured, and then wrap ribbon around the stem. You can either do a small ribbon bow, or go as far as wrapping the stems entirely with ribbon. Either tie off the ribbon or secure the ends with small pins, making sure they aren't sticking out and putting the bride's hands in danger of being poked!