Wedding Reception Flowers - Ideas from Tolly’s Flowers

Your choice of wedding flowers is one of the most important decisions to make when creating the perfect wedding venue. Wedding flowers enhance the magic and romance of your chosen setting, adding colour and beauty to your tables and creating stunning focal points for your guests to admire.

Tolly’s Flowers produce amazing wedding flowers for couples getting married in the South East of England as well as further afield. In every job that we undertake, we create grand floral displays for your wedding venue as well as everything else for your special day including bouquets, button holes, corsages and flowers for your church or civil ceremony. We are known for our high quality of work and the ability to create the maximum impact - whatever your budget.

Wedding Flowers - click here for more information on our range of services or contact us now to discuss your wedding!

Choosing Flowers for Your Wedding

Here at Tolly’s Flowers we know that with so many designs, colours and types of flower to choose from, selecting wedding flowers can be a daunting task. We will guide you through this process, to ensure the end result delights both you and all of your guests. Here we look at some of the things to consider when choosing wedding reception flowers.

Colour Schemes

One of the first things to think about when choosing wedding flowers is your colour scheme. Flowers are generally chosen to tie in with a theme, so that they match other elements such as bridesmaids dresses, the groom's tie and other decorations at your venue.

Often a bride will have a colour in mind that she just must have for her wedding! Her personal favourite, or perhaps a colour she has always imagined whilst visualising her perfect wedding. Other bride's may consider the meanings of different colours to add symbolism to their flower choice.

For example:

• A traditional choice of colour for wedding floral arrangements and bouquets is white. It is the symbol of purity, peace and innocence and looks elegant in all types of decorations and posies. Yellow is bright, sunny colour and is said to bring hope, optimism and happiness on your big day.
• If you want luck on your side, green is the colour for this as it represents good fortune and harmony.
• If you are looking for flowers that symbolise stability, blue is the colour to bring security and honesty to the lives of the happy couple.
• Pink is a feminine choice which indicates gentle passion and new beginnings, although bright pink symbolises fun and friendship, light pink has a softer, calmer quality.
• Red represents passion and is the colour traditionally chosen for roses on Valentine’s Day.
• Pale violet is serene and spiritual.

Flower Types and Their Meanings

Flowers, like colours also have different meanings. So if you want your bouquet or reception flowers to take on a symbolic significance, choose flowers that signify the qualities you desire.

• Tulips bring elegance and beauty to a spring wedding and red ones are said to symbolise love.
• Roses are a very traditional choice for wedding flowers and the different colour options take on different meanings: red roses symbolise passion and white ones represent love and beauty.
• Daisies indicate loyalty and innocence, so they are a good choice to have in a wedding bouquet, as are bluebells which signify eternal love.
• Lemon blossoms mean fidelity in love and so do violets and veronica.
• Freesias are another popular flower as they have tiny blooms that give off a wonderful fragrance. They come in a range of colours and symbolise trust.
• If a large family appeals to you, you might think about including orchids which in Chinese symbolism mean “many young children”. This type of flower also indicates love and beauty.

Whatever flowers you choose for your wedding day, also think about incorporating ivy in to some of the displays as this is the symbol of love, affection and faithfulness. And if you are looking for the perfect flowers for your honeymoon suite, orange ones are great for this as they signify joy and desire.

Styles of Table Decoration

The first flowers to consider when planning your wedding reception are your table decorations. These are a must, whatever your budget to create a wow-factor in the room.

There are many different types and styles of table decoration that will beautifully accessorise your venue.

Here at Tolly’s Flowers we produce everything from traditional table top decorations using pretty seasonal flowers, to dramatic contemporary centre-pieces, which can incorporate items such as candles, mirrors or glass vases. Choose from tall or low level arrangements or a combination of the two - for a cost effective yet striking effect.

Other Reception Flowers

As well as adding flowers to tables, wedding flowers can be used to add colour to almost any part of your reception venue. For example they can be used to decorate pillars, or add a wonderful romantic touch to a doorway or archway that the couple will walk under after making their vows.

Large pedestal displays in the hallway of your wedding venue will set the scene as guests arrive. You can also use flowers to embellish window sills, fire place surrounds and the backs of chairs or add a stunning finish to a simple wedding cake design.

Wedding Flowers - click here for more information on our range of services or contact us now to discuss your wedding!

Choosing Wedding Flowers – Part 2

Your wedding flowers are a vital part of your big day and long after your celebration, your wedding photographs will keep the memory of their beauty alive. Taking time and trouble over deciding on the perfect wedding flowers is important and an investment well worth making.

For a coordinated, perfect finish to your wedding you need to choose a wedding florist who specialises in creating beautiful wedding flowers, such as Tollys Flowers in Suffolk. Based in Newmarket we are the convenient choice for brides in Suffolk, Bury St Edmunds, Cambridge, Ely, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk, Essex and Hertfordshire.

We will create and co-ordinate all the flowers to complete your wedding day giving it a look and feel that is totally personal to the happy couple. You and your guests will be left with long-lasting memories and stunning photographs of a special day.

Last month we gave you tips and advice on choosing wedding flowers for your bridal bouquet, bridesmaid's flowers and flowers for buttonholes or corsages. Here we provide information on choosing wedding flowers for your church or ceremony venue, reception venue and your wedding cars.

Wedding Flowers – click here for full information on our wedding services.

Church or Ceremony Flowers

Adding flowers to your wedding venue is a wonderful way to introduce your guests to the colours and style of the wedding before the bride arrives. They set a visual scene and provide a talking point for guests to speculate on what the bride and bridesmaids' dresses might be like.

In the case of a church wedding, always discuss with the vicar what areas of the church you are allowed to decorate. Areas in the church to consider adding flowers are the entrance, pew ends, aisles, pulpit, font, archways and lych-gate.

Flowers will create your individual mark on the wedding ceremony venue, making it truly your own. Tolly’s Flowers can design everything from large, dramatic pedestal displays to simple flowers and bows on pew ends and everything in between. Depending on the style and size of your wedding, we will advise you on how you can create the biggest wow-factor for the budget you have available. We will also help you get the most for your money, by ensuring that your flowers double up as much as possible. For example, pew ends can be transported to your reception venue, to become your top table arrangement.

Reception Flowers

Flowers have a long history of being used for decoration at weddings and continuing the theme of flowers at your reception will link in with your church/venue flowers and bouquets.

Flowers will add a focal point at your reception entrance and where the wedding party lines up to greet the guests. Garlands over archways are popular along with striking pedestal displays.

You’ll also need flower displays for table centre pieces and the top table flower arrangements. Here again we will aim to save you money where we can, whilst still creating a dramatic effect. For example we can reduce the cost of your table centre pieces by creating half as tall displays and half much lower. The overall effect is still stunning, but you spend less money.

The wedding cake can be enhanced for photographs by adding flowers to give it that special finishing touch. This can be a simple arrangement at the cakes base, flowers or greenery trailed around the cake stand or a specific design inter linked with the overall look of the cake.

Something else to remember is that it is the custom to give both the mother of the bride and groom a bouquet of flowers at the reception, usually during the speeches.

Whether you are having an intimate family wedding or a grand reception with hundreds of guests, the right floral decoration at the wedding breakfast and evening party, will lend that added special touch to your day.

Wedding Cars

When you are driven from the ceremony to the reception you want to travel in style and no wedding car is complete without a floral decoration. A low spray of flowers across the back parcel shelf can be very effective, especially in photographs. Flowers on the bonnet, the door handles and interwoven with ribbons are also striking and unique. Here you can tie the colour theme of your flowers and dresses in with the style of car, although white or cream flowers will always look stunning especially on vintage models.

Wedding Flowers – click here for full information on our wedding services.

Choosing Wedding Flowers

Choosing wedding flowers is an important part of planning a wedding. Flowers make your wedding day special and unique to you. Wedding flowers are the perfect way to signify love, trust, beauty and romance. Brides can work with the wedding florist to choose flowers for every aspect of their special day.

If you are looking for wedding flowers in Suffolk then Tolly's Flowers, based in Newmarket, are an esteemed wedding florist. We specialise in all types of wedding flowers including the bride’s bouquet, bridesmaid’s flowers, buttonholes and corsages.

When you choose Tolly’s Flowers as your wedding florist we can create floral arrangements that show your unique signature and style on your wedding day. When we plan your wedding flowers with you we aim to complement your chosen colours and reflect the bride and groom’s personality.

In this article we look at the bride's bouquet, bridesmaids flowers and buttonholes and corsages – including the history and traditions of these important accessories and guidance on choosing these for your special day.

Wedding Flowers  – click here for full information on our wedding services.

Bridal Bouquets

The bridal bouquet is undoubtedly the most important of your wedding flowers. This floral arrangement is the one you can guarantee everybody will be talking about. The bridal bouquet needs to complement the dress, the style of the wedding and the bride’s personality.

The bridal bouquet is steeped in tradition. In ancient times they didn’t contain flowers but strong scented herbs and spices, which were believed to ward off evil spirits and symbolised fidelity. These herbs were sometimes tucked under the bride’s veil rather than being carried as a bouquet. In Tudor England, brides carried marigolds doused in rosewater and ate them when the ceremony had finished as an aphrodisiac!

Later flowers were made part of the wedding ceremony as a symbol of fertility and the first bouquets were made from orange blossom. Orange blossom is now the world's most used wedding flower and mainly popular in Spain, where the tradition is it represents happiness and fulfillment. This is because the orange tree flowers and bears fruit all at the same time.

The tradition of throwing the bridal bouquet stems from England. Female wedding guests used to reach to tear the brides dress and flowers to have her good luck rub off on them. To avoid this the bride would toss her bouquet to the women and run away. In Victorian times, the bride would toss her bouquet to a friend as she left the reception to keep them safe and to pass on good fortune.

Today the bouquet is tossed to unmarried ladies in the belief that whoever catches it will marry next.

Bridal bouquets used to only consist of white flowers as a sign of purity. However today many colours of wedding flowers are available to complement the bride's and bridesmaids' dresses and the overall colour scheme of the wedding.

There is a large range of classic and contemporary shapes of bouquet for you to choose from too. Tolly’s Flowers will advise you on the flowers best suited to your preferred bouquet style. Whether you want contemporary or traditional wedding flowers, your bouquet can be a fully wired shower or a simple hand-tied posy designed just for you.

The most popular designs are trailing waterfall or a long cascading bouquet, which suit taller brides in long, more traditional gowns. Small, bouquets like a hand tied round posy or a bouquet that lies across the arm are better for shorter brides in knee length dresses. Simple single blooms are best for more ornate styles regardless of your height.

However traditional rules don’t have to followed leaving a bride to turn her own ideas into a unique bridal bouquet with the help of a wedding florist, making the possibilities limitless.


Bridesmaids Flowers

The tradition of having bridesmaids as part of the bridal party is many centuries old. As bridesmaids were dressed the same as the bride they were there to fool evil spirits and protect the bride from anything bad happening. Today the bride will choose a colour scheme for the bridesmaids dresses and flowers to complement her own.

Bridesmaid bouquets are often simpler than the bridal bouquet for example a hand tied posy, pomander or for younger bridesmaids a basket arrangement. Gerbera, roses and sweet peas are popular flowers for bridesmaids.


Button Holes and Corsages

The groom’s buttonhole flower is usually one that is present in the bride's bouquet. This tradition dates back from when knights would wear his lady's colours in the form of a handkerchief or ”favour” to show his affection. In some cultures the groom will throw his buttonhole over his shoulder to single male guests in the same manner as the bride throwing her bouquet.

Don’t forget to include buttonholes for the best man, ushers, fathers and grandfathers. These are often a luxurious style buttonhole to co-ordinate with the groom and the colour scheme of the wedding flowers.

We also supply beautiful wedding corsages for important female family members like mothers, aunts and grandmothers.

Buttonholes for the congregation can link the theme of your chosen wedding flowers with your wedding guests. For wedding guests we suggest that you select single stem buttonholes.

Wedding Flowers – click here for full information on our wedding services.

Next month we will look at choosing flowers for churches / ceremony and reception venues and decorating wedding cars.