Ninth Time's the Charm

Finding a florist was, by far, the most torturous process in my wedding planning. Honesty first: I had a very, very bare-bones floral budget, and I couldn't find any possible way to juggle the money enough to beef it up. I felt bad and self-conscious about my skimpy budget, and I knew that I was most definitely not a florist's ideal client. However, I do wish that some of the florists I spoke with had been a little kinder. I felt bad to begin with, and I felt worse every time I got laughed at, sneered at, or ignored. I went through a lot of phone consultations, e-mails, and in-store consultations, and had earnestly begun to Google "weddings with no flowers."

Then, on our last trip to Pittsburgh, in a last-ditch final attempt, I found the right florist for us. HOORAY! We are using Parkway Florist, and I could not be any happier about the choice. This photo of Cheryl's beautiful work totally sold me:


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I've mentioned already that the whole color scheme for our wedding was built around the idea of a dark red bridal bouquet. I told Cheryl that I was imagining a fluffy, full bouquet, using flowers that have lots of petals. I brought in these inspiration pictures....


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and we decided that my bouquet will be made of freedom red roses, black magic roses, red dahlias, burgundy dahlias, and red hypericum berries. It will have a ivory-satin-wrapped stem with pearl pins.


(Roses and burgundy dahlia from here, red dahlia from here.)

For the girls' bouquets, I was hoping for the same sort of style: fluffy, full, ruffly petals. I showed Cheryl this photo from Style Me Pretty, which really demonstrated the multi-colored, jewel-toned look I'm trying to get.


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So here's what we came up with....


(Top row: 1, 2, 3. Middle row: 1, 2, 3. Bottom row: 1, 2, 3, 4.)

Various purple, deep pink, and burgundy shades of dahlias, ranunculus, and stock, as well as a few freedom red roses. Like the Style Me Pretty bouquet, the bridesmaids' bouquets will also have green (unopened) hypericum berries to break up the jewel tones and give it a little pop against their red dresses.

I AM SO PUMPED ABOUT THIS!!!! Considering I had seriously started to think that flowers weren't going to be possible at all, I am gleeful that I found someone who does beautiful work at great prices. I seriously get a little thrill of excitement every time I read over our floral agreement.

Centerpieces are a topic for another post, but for now, DAHLIAS! ROSES! EEEEEE!!!!

What was your hardest vendor to find?