“Which flowers for a November wedding? Which flowers for March?”
Besides making masks and hand sanitizers at home (and not enjoying it), I have spent the past 2 months witnessing all of you, husbands and wives to be, navigate all the obstacles that eventually led to the postponement of your wedding. Some of you have reached out to get my input – which I am always happy to give –, and some of you have dealt with it in private.
Whether you needed my help or not, I have been thinking a lot about these changes myself, on my own (in between non-enjoyable mask making sessions).
Some of you are postponing your celebration to the same week-end next year, but some of you have opted for a whole different season. And it got me to wonder: what are the biggest challenges you will have to deal with if your wedding is now scheduled during a whole new season? You might have to think about an extra layer on top of your spaghetti-strap dress, or ditch the long sleeves. And ALL of you will have to rethink your flower options.
So that’s what I’m here to talk about today: how to pick the right flowers for your new wedding date? If your love party was originally planned for May, what kind of flowers can you now pick for your November wedding? Can you even find good flower alternatives out there for colder months?
The answer is a big, heartfelt YES. And to illustrate my point, I have asked the wonderful and badass ladies over at Stems Brooklyn to share their favorite flowers for each season with you with pictures taken by yours truly as well as Stems Brooklyn. So here we go!
Winter wedding flowers (December to March)
Winters are HARSH is the Northeast, but it doesn’t mean there aren’t some beautiful flower choices to pick from. Zara, over at Stems, tells us:
“We are big fans of hellebores. They range in color from frosty white to moody eggplant, and when cut properly can be extremely hardy and long lasting. Other early bloomers include fritillaria, iris, bleeding hearts, and anemones. We’re also obsessed with mimosa, a super bright and funky yellow bloom that occurs on acacia foliage during January and February. Acacia also happens to be our favorite winter foliage, with its purple tinged soft evergreen leaves.”
What’s amazing with winter flowers is that you can go for a cosy, warm feel with velvety hellebores and acacia foliage or an exotic, colorful feel with funky flowers like fritillaria and iris. And of course you can all out with an explosion of color with mimosa, like this gorgeous wedding arch by Stems Brooklyn (pictured below and impossible to miss).
a wedding bouquet with hellebores on the left (by Verde Fleurs), a wedding arch with mimosas on the right (by Stems Brooklyn)
Spring wedding flowers (March to June)
Spring is synonym of blooms and we all wait for the first flowers to point out of the snow to officially declare winter over. There are a myriad of flowers to pick from for a Spring wedding, so let’s see what Zara has to say about this bountiful season:
“Favorites include the well known ranunculus, which has a huge variety of unique colors and varieties in the spring, sweet pea with its unmatched scent and delicate petal, and the mother of all flowers, the peony, our favorite variety being the Coral Charm. This is also the time of year for your favorite blooming branches, like lilac, cherry, dogwood, and spirea, and unique garden locals like Icelandic poppies. We like woodsy garden foliages for spring like soft ferns, whimsical curly willow, and sweet smelling eriostemon.”
Like I said above: bountiful. Those flowers will fit all kinds of weddings, from romantic and classic with beautiful peonies to lush and extravagant with lots of colorful ranunculus (see below). A lot of those flowers come in a wide range of colors as well, making is very easy to match your wedding vision.
Funky ranunculus on the left (by Rosewood), romantic peonies on the right (by Liv Florally)
Summer wedding flowers (June to September)
Summer is a fun times for weddings; everybody is thinking about their upcoming vacation, drinking on rooftops and BBQing with friends every week-end (that’ genuinely what I think New-Yorkers do all over town). Zara has lots to say about Summer flowers:
“We love to source most of our summer flowers direct from local farms and make use of their abundance of blooming field flowers like cosmos, phlox, rudbeckia, celosia, and larkspur. Bouquets and arrangements from the summer season really feel freshly picked and straight from the ground, and can incorporate seasonal herbs like flowering dill, basil, and borage. Bright green foliages like bupleurum, raspberry leaves, and blueberry branches pair well with the colorful palette.”
Check this gorgeous bouquet below. Bright colors and fun color combinations go so well with the carelessness of Summer. I am in love.
Summer bouquet by Stems Brooklyn, including some their favorites: rudbeckias and larkspurs
Fall wedding flowers (September to November)
Fall is prime wedding season. The weather is less extreme and leaves start turning into their gorgeous shades of yellow and orange. Zara points out that couples love to honor nature’s natural colors and textures during this special season.
“The flower of the season has to be the dahlia, with our favorites being the ideally colored burgundy varieties, and the big blush cafe au lait. These pair wonderfully with queen red lime zinnias, lisianthus, scabiosa, amaranthus, and tardiva hydrangea. For foliage we like to honor the season with grassy cuttings like explosion grass and pampas, and seasonal branches like russian olive, forsythia, and maple.”
Fall is all about deep colors and textures, which go so well with the changing greenery outdoors. Check the photos below to see how comforting dahlias and pampa grass feel in a flower arrangement.
Pampa grass and mimosas. Bouquets by Snowdrop Flowers.
That’s all for this one, folks. If you have any questions about which flowers to use for your wedding, don’t hesitate to reach out to me or to Stems Brooklyn. These ladies are the BEST, and as you can tell from all the Googling you’ll have to do after reading about their personal input on seasonal flowers, they know their stuff.