Do it Yourself Flower Arrangements: Six Ways for a Novice to Arrange Flowers

When someone gives you flowers or you pick them from your garden, it is often hard to know how to arrange them. There are six basic floral arrangements, and certain flowers are best suited for a specific arrangement style. Here are some tips that even a novice can employ to arrange flowers to their best advantage.

When you receive flower bouquets as a gift of buy them from the store, the arrangement generally is pre-shaped, essentially just requiring you to find a container that suits the flowers themselves. Generally, the taller the bouquet, the studier the vase or container needs to be, and the height should be about 2/3 the height of the flower stalk themselves. A larger, short gathering of flowers of one length, such as lily of the valley, will require a shallower vase with a large open mouth. It is good to have

If you are picking flowers from your own garden, often they will take on an arrangement shape while you pick them. Longer stalks towards the center and smaller and shorter flowers towards the outside perimeter. When you first go to arrange them, grab the arrangement in your fist and drop them into an open mouthed vase and see if you like the free form arrangement as is. If not, decide on if some flowers should be cut shorter and arranged in one of six styles.

The first kind of arrangement is domed. This is best for when you have large amounts of a single type of flower or branches of flowers such as roses, and you will arrange them in a tight arch with the tallest in the center and the shorter on the perimeter supported by the rim of the vase or container. A wide bowl like container is helpful for this kind of arrangement. A floral frog or pebbles or marbles helps anchor the flowers and steady the vase with some weight on the top to make sure the vase is not too top heavy. A thin necked, tall vase is out of place with a voluminous bouquet, so stick with wide mouth containers or divide your flowers into several containers.

The second kind of arrangement is a spiky one; it is best suited for tall lean flowers such as delphiniums or gladiolas. You can cut them to various lengths if the vase you are using has a curved shape, insert the tallest stalks first and the shortest stalks last. Heavier foliage is good to put in the middle and place the stalks with more buds more prominently in the bouquet. Make sure your container is tall enough to support the stalks and visually balance the height of tall flowers such as sunflowers and glads.

The third kind of arrangement is single. For this you use flowers that are a single bloom that have enough presence to stand on their own. A good example for this is a single gerbera daisy, a dahlia bloom, a large open rose or peony (not in bud), or an orchid or lily. A glass bowl with a mouth slightly smaller than the bloom is best for display, and several small arrangements of this kind grouped together, especially in odd numbers of 3, 5 or 7 arrangements, look especially pretty. When setting a flower upon the rim of a cup or small bowl, be sure to leave at least inch or so of stem attached, so the bloom can continue to drink. You can also use antique bottles or pretty vintage bottles. This is a great way to show off a beautiful bloom that might otherwise get lost in a larger arrangement and is a good idea for any flower head that flops over because it is too heavy for the stem or stalk it is on. It is also a good option for a flower that is starting to lose its bloom and needs more support than a traditional arrangement can offer, this way it has lots of water for a short stalk and bloom.

The next option is floating arrangements. Seen most often as centerpieces, several open flowers are floating in a large open bowl, such as a punch bowl. For a flower to float it needs to be relatively lightweight such as an orchid, spider mums or be a flower made of paper thin petals, such as an open peony. Generally this type of arrangement will not work with roses, but will work with rose petals. If you are pairing floating flowers with floating candles, make sure the candle is wide enough so that the flame does not bump into the flower itself (such as could happen with peony petals that can be long enough to potential reach the candle flame) . When floating flowers in water, first try cutting the stems to less than an inch, and see if the flower floats or not to assess if it is a good kind for this arrangement. If it does not, use a piece of bubble wrap, make a circle, and stick the stem inside the circle hole. This will make a tiny life preserver device for the flower to try to help it float. Usually the flowers that naturally float are the prettiest in water, so don't unduly force a flower that doesn't want to float.

The next option is a free form arrangement. This option is best for garden cuttings and informal flowers, such as if you have a rose or two to display and some mis-matched flowers and roses from your garden, but looks good with one type of flower, such as all tulips or calla lilies as well. It is a great option if you have pretty containers like baskets or vintage pieces or bottles or jars. A tiny free form arrangement is a great use for a broken or chipped teacup that is just too pretty to throw away. When you are using a container that is not watertight or you do not want to get wet due to age or value, hide water filled jars inside the container or basket to hold the flowers. Depending on the size of the container, you may need to pad the glass container with some bubble wrap or newspaper to secure it. A free form arrangement is generally arranged one stem at a time in order to display each bud to best advantage, start with the largest blooms, place your tiny blooms in last and fill in holes with leaves like hosta leaves.

The last option is a grouped arrangement. Often done with small silver mint julep cups (which can be a family heirloom or picked up at estate or tag sales). The arrangements are filled with small singular flowers such as paper-whites, roses, grape hyacinths, star of Bethlehem and other small "detailed" flowers that often get lost in larger arrangements. These are very pretty groups in threes, or tucked into places like guest room nightstands and bathroom shelves or other places that lend towards needing a little decoration.