Insider Secrets From Kate and Pippa’s Wedding Florists

Our editor-at-large, Jade Beer, speaks to Shane Connolly and Sue Barnes of Lavender Green Flowers to discover how to create your dream wedding flowers with seasonality, sustainability and scent all forefront of mind. Lavender Green have recently opened a new store on the King’s Road in Chelsea – it’s the perfect place to get inspired and start envisioning your wedding flowers and arrangements. Here are the Insider Secrets From Kate and Pippa’s Wedding Florists…

GO BACK TO BASICS 

Shane: ‘My niece got married this year and it was one of the most wonderful weddings I’ve ever been to in my life. There were thirty guests. I cut flowers from the garden, some British sweet peas and we had a wedding like it probably used to be. We put a table up in the trees beside their house in some woodland. It was about as sustainable as you can get. Even the fabric I bought for the tablecloth is going to be used to make curtains for their bedroom. Those kinds of decisions can change the integrity and the feeling of the whole event.’ 

START WITH SEASONALITY 

Shane: ‘Think about the season you are marrying in and don’t fight it. If you’re getting married in October and you don’t like Autumn colours, then why are you getting married in October? Embrace what is available. Think about it like eating in a really great restaurant. What would you think was good about seeing strawberries on the menu in December? So why should you have roses and peonies and lilies all the year round? There are so many more excitements to each season. To give your guests an insight into what the world of nature is doing at any given time is such a gift, it’s so memorable. Peonies in June are when they’re at their best. Peonies in November are transported on cold freight from Australia, and they’re very expensive. Weddings can be so much more interesting and unique than that.’

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BUDGET LIKE A PRO

Sue: ‘Decorate the most important areas of your venue first with displays that are big enough and in proportion with the scale of each room. Don’t forget to consider the redundant spaces in larger venues that result from having fewer guests. A smaller guest list may mean you can divert more of the budget into the florals. Always ask florists to give you the size of each design as what looks big enough in a photo could be far too small to create the right backdrop for photos. If you are unsure about what is the most important point in any room, stand at the entrance and see where your eye goes to first? In the first instance look at what you need and make these designs as big as you can possibly afford. Then, look at what you can afford from any leftover budget.’

TRUST THE EXPERTS 

Shane: ‘In your initial conversations, give your florist or floral designer your preferences, like I love all shades of muted colours or I don’t like brights, or I like things to look really architectural and then trust them and let them do their best for you. They will know what is best at what time of year. Pink, for example, is very hard to find in flowers in certain months, in December and January it’s not a great colour to choose.’ 

DON’T FORGET FOLIAGE AND SCENT 

Sue: ‘Cut olive, eucalyptus, white beam, birch and glossy leaved soft ruscus, all look and smell amazing. Dependent upon the time of year, wisteria arches, jasmine and heavenly scented gardenia will all provide dreamy aromas. For added glamour consider swathes of lavender, peonies and the gorgeous smell of garden roses. So much effort goes into multi-sensory decorating so that everything looks, smells and feels authentic, regardless of where you are hosting your celebrations. The fragrance of a particular flower is hugely important. We are often found wafting bunches of tuberose, just before the bride enters a room. Another great way to fragrance a marquee is to cut rosemary and scatter it on the floor, underneath dining tables. As guests tread onto the leaves, the most amazing scent is released, lasting throughout the wedding breakfast. Fragrances can completely change atmospheres. Try frankincense in a church or uplifting geranium during the reception, or something deep and powerful like pepper or woody Oudh later in the evening. It helps to make each part of the wedding that much more memorable.’

LOOK TO BRITISH GROWERS 

SHANE: ‘There are three London-based flower growers and if you go as far as Oxfordshire or Kent there are many more. At the flower market in London, which is the central hub of all flowers, they have one stand which almost exclusively sells English flowers and two foliage suppliers who sell only English produced foliage. A lot of the British growers grow as close to organically as possible. But a lot of the flowers that come from abroad, especially the African countries and Columbia are sprayed before they leave their countries with various chemicals and then when they arrive in Holland they’re sprayed again to comply with the different biodiversity rules in each country – and then when they come to England they might be sprayed again.  You have all those chemicals on those flowers. A lot of them have been dipped in preservatives and some have been sprayed with chemicals to stop you being able to grow them yourself from a cutting.’ 

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GET GLOBALLY INSPIRED

Sue: ‘The unpredictability of future overseas travel is inspiring some couples to bring their favourite locations to their wedding days. They want to have the feel of the Tuscan or Provençal countryside, the elegance of a Florentine courtyard or the fragrance of a Mediterranean orange or lemon grove right here in the UK. In this case, it’s important to have a high degree of finish. Not just to supply lemon trees, orange trees, olives, thyme and lavender, but to put these into context with the right containers – beautiful French Anduze pots, hand-thrown terracotta classic courtyard stoneware or huge rustic baskets. On a larger wedding, stone fountains, water-filled lead troughs and rills look incredible and add the all-important sound of cascading water.  The money saved on travel, the headache and unpredictability of organising an overseas wedding and the fact that couples are also cutting down the carbon footprint of their wedding, is making the UK-based Mediterranean dream a hugely popular, and very beautiful, option.’ 

THE SECRET TO THE WOW FACTOR

Shane: ‘I would get much more of a wow if the bride and groom had been thoughtful. How much nicer to say we were plastic free for our wedding. I want people to be moved rather than be impressed. I want people to say I haven’t seen sweet peas like that since my granny grew them in her allotment. Not, oh my God, I’ve never seen so many flowers in my life. Anyone can do that. It shouldn’t feel like an all you can eat buffet.’ 

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AVOID FLORAL FOAM 

Shane: ‘It is perhaps the easiest thing to do. Floral foam is non bio-degradeable, it’s micro-plastics. All the water it soaks in travels down into our eco system until it eventually makes it back to us through the fish in our oceans. It’s something that you really don’t want to have at your wedding if you’re trying to be sustainable. I haven’t used it since 2012. I thought, if I can do the Duke and Duchess’s wedding on that scale without floral foam, why am I even thinking of using it for other things.’ 

GIVE YOUR FLOWERS A SECOND LIFE

Sue: ‘If taking flowers home is not an option, we have always donated any that are in good condition to charity. We’re currently working with thirteen on a regular basis. We have been doing this for nearly thirty years. What we also love to do is to give lasting flower memories to brides. If a bridal bouquet contains flowers that are cut from their corms or bulbs (such as Lily of the Valley), we carefully save these and deliver them so that they can be planted and appear in the garden year after year.’ 

Shane: ‘Charities like Floral Angels will take flowers after an event and repurpose them, take them to care homes, old people’s homes or women’s shelters, sometimes to people who have never been given flowers in their lives. Or use growing elements that can be given away. My niece’s wedding used lots of herbs, so her mother has planted a wedding memorial herb garden. Trees are great for that too.’

For more info: www.lavendergreen.co.uk

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