calla lilies

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Floral Chandeliers

Add some drama to your wedding or event with a floral chandelier.  It will create a focal point in the room and be a real talking point for guests.  Earlier in the summer I posted some articles about the Chelsea Florist of the Year and Young Florist of the Year competitions.  The florists had to create a floral chandelier for the Queen’s Jubilee dinner.  Some of the lucky entrants even got to meet the Queen when she visited the show and admired their work.

Today I’ve got some more chandelier inspiration for you and a few more of the amazing chandeliers from Chelsea Flower Show.  The design above has been attached to a chandelier in a wedding marquee.  It features vibrant lime, purple and cerise flowers, with dendrobium and phalaenopsis orchids hanging down.

The stunning chandelier above was made by Jessica Rose Andrews from The Garden Rose florist.  The design is based on a chandelier frame wrapped with textiles and hanging glass baubles.  I love how the intense indigo and violet flowers contrast with the green passion flower vines.  Jessica was awarded a gold medal for her design.

This chandelier by Betsy Ford is a simple but effective wedding decoration.  Betsy has hung germinis from a chandelier of fairy lights.

Katie-Jane Pridmore made this very elegant design, it contained lots of strings of pearls and intricate wire work.  The central garland of flowers contained phalaenopsis orchids, cymbidium orchids, carnations and gypsophila. Katie-Jane received a Silver Grenfell medal for her piece.

This beautiful tiered chandelier is by Erica Tippett of Bleujen Florist.  I really like this design, it was awarded a Bronze Grenfell medal, which I think is a bit mean.  The design features gold chains and hundreds of hanging crystals.

Floral Chandeliers can be very extravagant with hundreds of flowers and twinkling crystals, like the ones at Chelsea show or quite simple.  If your venue already has a central chandelier, your florist may be able to make a simple design of hanging flowers to rest on it. Which ever style of design you decide on it is sure to create wow factor and be remembered by your guests.

Images:

1 Cerise chandelier – stylemepretty.com, Donna Von Bruening Photography

2 Purple chandelier – Jessica Rose Andrews, The Rose Garden

3 Yellow gerbera chandelier – greenweddingshoes.com, Lemon Lime Photography

4 White chandelier- Katie-Jane Pridmore

5 Gold tiered chandelier – Erica Tippett, Bleujen Florist

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the-sun-by-askham-bryan-college

This year there is a special competition for colleges, with the theme Flights of Fancy.  This links in with Tatton Park’s Art Biennial theme.   The colleges were given a space of 2m x 2.5m to work within.

the-sun-askham-bryan-college

The award for best exhibit was given to Askham Bryan College, for their stunning design ‘The Sun’.  They also achieved a Silver-Gilt medal.  Their designs featured a frame of copper pipes holding perspex rings and rings covered in coloured wool.

askham-bryan-tatton-flower-show

Hundreds of test tubes held flower in shades of red, oranges and yellows including phalaenopis orchids, gloriosa, calla lilies, oncidium orchids, craspedia, and echivaria.  Strands of threaded hypericum berries hung around the design.

bishop-burton-college-tatton-flower-show

Bishop Burton College gained a Bronze Grenfell medal for their design, ‘The Flight of Amy Johnson’. They used flowers to represent places that Amy travelled to on her pioneering flights in the 1930s, including England, Australia and India. They used orchids, scabious, celosia, calla lilies, agapanthus, echinops, alliums, anthuriums, cinnamon sticks and aloe vera plants.

east-surrey-college-tatton-flower-show

Water meadows and flights of floral ‘birds’ were the inspiration behind East Surrey College’s design, they were awarded a Silver Grenfell medal.  They used frames woven with textiles and test tubes to hold materials in place.  Their design featured strelitzia, longiflorum lilies, anthuriums, roses, chrysanthemums, snake grass and gerberas.

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An Autumn Wedding

autumn wedding flowers

This time last year I had the pleasure of providing wedding flowers for some good friends of mine.  It’s always extra special when you personally know the bride and groom, and they had also asked me to be a bride’s maid.  It was a gorgeous wedding at The Inn at Whitewell, in The Forest of Bowland.  The ceremony was held at St Hubert’s Dunsop Bridge, a few miles from Whitewell.  Before the ceremony guests were treated to a string quartet in the church and then afterwards at the reception.  Rose buttonholes with ivy leaves were worn by the wedding party.  The wedding reception took place in a marquee at the Inn at Whitewell. There are fabulous views from the inn across the river Hodder and parkland beyond.

The bride picked beautiful bottle green dresses for the bridesmaids.  After much deliberation (and several mood boards) an autumnal palette was decided on for the flowers.  The bridal bouquet was a large informal handtied bouquet.  The flowers centred on cherry brandy roses, these stunning roses were featured in all the wedding designs.  They have red outer petals and open into a warm orange.  Other flowers featured were mango calla lilies, burnt orange freesia, pincushion proteas, orange gerberas and hypericum berries.

bridemaids

A smaller version of the bridal bouquet was carried by the bride’s maids, which looked stunning against the deep green dresses.  The flower girl wore an ivory dress with a green sash and carried a gold wand with a single cherry brandy rose.  Marquees are perfect blank canvas for any colour scheme, the rich colours of the reception flowers made it feel warm and inviting.  The table designs were candle arrangements in baskets using roses, gerberas and freesia. I also used larch branches and red oak leaves to emphasis the autumnal feel.

The bride wanted the cake to be simple and elegant so we scattered some cherry brandy petals around it and on the cake table.  It was an elegant three tier design simply iced and decorated with green ribbon and diamante buckles.  In the evening the fairy lights covering the ceiling gave the wedding a warm glow which perfectly complemented the candlelight of the table arrangements.

A fabulous weekend was had by everyone who attended.  The weather stayed fine all day and the sun even made an appearance for the photos.  I wish the bride and groom every happiness in their life together!

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