Alice's wedding

My friend Alice got married yesterday and we were happy to help her decorate her fabulous house. She owns wonderful Victorian silver baskets and we filled these with interesting flowers in a palette of yellow, burgandy and brown with silver touches using orchids and other flowers that presented a modern take on the Victorian aesthetic.

Big Week

We had a bunch of work this week and I am going to post a bit of what we made....these photos are from the farmhouse at Landon - an event venue at the school. The original founders of the school lived in this house and it is charming and gracious and we are always happy to have our work there....these pieces include Kameleon roses, dusty miller, seeded eucalyptus and hydrangeas.

Megan's wedding

Last week, Megan and Matt got married in her family's backyard. I have known this family for many years and Megan's mom Lloydie and I had spoken about my doing the wedding flowers for a long time. Megan wanted yellow and blue flowers - we used sunflowers, blue hydrangeas and delphinium to make her bouquet and arrangements that were bright and cheerful. We also decorated the backyard trellis with grapevine and dried hydrangeas and floated yellow gerbers in the pond.

Tiffany and Eric's wedding

Tiffany and Eric got married at Woodend, the Audubon Society mansion in Chevy Chase, Maryland on this most perfect golden fall afternoon. She chose a wonderful palette of red, gold, rust and orange and we used Konfetti roses, golden cymbidium orchids, photinia leaves, red mums, peach hypericum and red rose hips to create the various arrangements. Her bouquet was made from Flame callas, peach hypericum and red rose hips ringed with photinia. She was wonderful to work with and happy with the results.

Tiara Day

Most Friday mornings I get a call from Kate and in turn I call Helen and Ruth. Around 9:30 we meet at my house and spend the morning going to estate sales. We go to sales in Maryland and DC and Virginia if we are feeling adventurous. My excuse for this is that I am always looking for interesting containers for flower arrangements and for garden stuff. We are not shy about commenting on all the details of the houses we visit, inside and out and that is as much fun as looking for things to buy.

Today, Kate and Ruth and I went out and while looking for a sale in Kensington, Maryland happened on the cutest store. It is called Tiara Day and is located on Metropolitan Avenue at the corner of Wheatley Ave. If you are in town, you must see this store. The owner is Maria Peck and she has assembled the most wonderful collection of vintage clothes and objects with very interesting new stuff - candles, jewelry, wonderful cards - I could go on and on. There is a web site and you can link to her blog on the most recent page of this blog. If I ever have a store, it would be just like this.

Potomac Floral Wholesale

Today I was picking up some flowers from our supplier and it occurred to me that they deserve a mention on this blog. There are weeks when we drop in to Potomac almost every single day and we are always able to find something interesting and exciting to use in our arrangements. The people who work there are without exception knowledgeable and helpful. At times we take our clients over to Potomac to take a look at what is available and the client is always impressed.
So this is a small thanks to everyone at Potomac and especially Evan, Robin, Tony, Randall, Lucy, Marvin and Leo.

Our Beautiful Bride

CaSandra got married today and she was our second beautiful bride of the weekend. We made a bouquet for her that was different from our more typical hand-tied European style bouquet. CaSandra wanted tropical flowers in her bouquet and a very bright palette. We put orange protea, pink/green Anthirium, yellow Oncidium orchids, orange Spray Roses, pink Cymbidium orchids, Ti leaves and mango Callas in a bouquet holder and tied it off with a gold ribbon.

2 weddings and a ballet reception

Hal and I did a lot of work with weekend - 2 weddings, 1 tiny and 1 medium size, and a ballet group reception. The first wedding was at a French parish hall in DC where we had done another small wedding several years ago. The color palette was green and white and grey and we used some interesting flowers from the last blooms of my garden. The first photo is of a coffee table arrangement, the second of the bride's bouquet, and the last of the wreath on the door. Green and white arrangements seem to be very popular these days.

Golden Bear arrangments

The color scheme of the pieces for last night's event was cream and white flowers on brown and tan pintucked linens. We used white hydrangeas, cream roses, white stock, white dendrobium orchids and variagated ivy leaves and ferns in different combinations to create the arrangements.

Landon's Golden Bear Dinner

Yesterday, Hal and I created many arrangements for Landon's Golden Bear dinner. This first post shows the beautiful Perkins House and the tent on the large front lawn of the house on the Landon campus. This was a beautiful setting for a lovely evening.

Dinner Party

Hal and I made these arrangements for a dinner party tonight. We used Moca Magic roses, garden hydrangeas, sedum, scabiosa pods and turning dogwood leaves for an early fall feeling.

Holton dinner party

Last week there was a dinner party at Granger House, the home of the head of school, at Holton. I used a hot palette, yellow lilies, pink roses and pink celosia with coleus leaves for an end of summer vibe.

Happy bushes

A friend of mine took this picture today - too cute and fun. I wonder what the neighbors think?

Centerpiece sample

This is a sample for a wedding centerpiece. The bride wanted something modern and tropical with very bright colors and alot of drama - we used Hot Lady roses, Birds of Paradise, gold mums, orange spray roses, Aralia leaves, horsetail and curly willow in a low glass vase.

Bouquets

When the girls at Holton graduate they carry bouquets of 6 roses, baby's breath and ferns. For the past few years, Hal and I have been making them and they seem to be the perfect thing for a young graduate. Now look at these armloads - no wonder no one is smiling....

Back to School

This week we did the flowers for two events at the Landon School. For both we used a palette of green and white but tweaked in different ways. We love both - the first of green, white and the grey of Dusty Miller foliage, the second, greens in several tones from chartreuse to dark green and white.

Hitomi Gilliam

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of attending a workshop with Hitomi Gilliam, a Vancouver based floral designer whose work is wonderfully fresh and inspiring. In a 4 hour workshop she shared many techniques and ideas that got all of us wanting to add something new to our creative pursuits. These are some photos of her work.

Wordle

If you go to Wordle.net, you can create a word cloud. You can either send Wordle to your blog or you can type in text and see what comes up - it is interesting - the words used the most in the text or blog have the most prominence and so on. Check it out. I made one just now using the blog and it is fun. You can search for mine by typing in Chic Floral Designs in the search box on the Wordle site.

On Saturday we did the flowers for a happy enthusiastic bride. We used colors that reflected her personality and exuberance. The low pieces included green hydrangea, Voodoo orange roses and Shocking Versilia pink roses. Green dendrobium orchids burst out of a base of the same roses mixed with varigated pittosporum and salal in the tall pieces. The escort table was the most exciting for her - dark fuschia dendrobiums and curly willow sprang out of a base of dark pink hydrangea, pink dahlias, and roses. We hung beaded pink votive candle holders from the top and put a pink cymbidium stalk in the base. The projected storms did not materialize and she had a great day.

Elegant Bride

My family has always been into collecting and I was introduced to this pastime at a very early age. Antiquing on Sundays was a major activity - we didn't buy much, but we sure looked around a lot. I was always drawn to old photographs and have a collection of pictures of people I am in no way related to and some old pictures of my own family members. Lately, I have been looking for old photos of brides and flower-related events. I am going to post them from time to time - they are fun to look at and see the different ways flowers were used in the past.

Wedding at St. Matthews

On Saturday we did a wedding at St. Matthews Cathedral in DC. The beautiful bride wanted a bright palette of yellow and cream. She carried a large bouquet of cream roses, Goldstrike yellow roses and some lime green baby hydrangeas ringed with varigated pittosporum. The bridesmaids wore their own black dresses and carried Goldstrike roses ringed with white caspia and a little pittosporum. The altar pieces were cream and bright yellow and were visible from the back of this large church.

We delivered a bouquet to a bride today who, aside from telling us which colors she liked best, let us do whatever we liked.....and this is the result......dark purple callas, red spray roses, orange freesias, green roses with tropical leaves.....

Estelle's wedding

Today we did a wedding at Woodend, the Audubon Society site in Chevy Chase, Maryland. The ceremony was in a juniper grove away from the mansion and the reception was in the house and in a tent on the patio. We used two color stories for the event - the ceremony was beige, cream, peach and pink and the reception was a brighter palette of blue, coral, lavender, cream and purple.

Bye Bye Birdie

Bear with me - or wait until next week when we do the flowers for a wedding - check back then.
Meantime, for all you bird watchers - today the biggest baddest baby flew the nest! It wriggled out of the birdhouse and hopped down to the porch. He seemed a little disoriented for a few minutes. The mom appeared and was pretty surprised I think even though he had spent the morning pushing himself further and further out of the birdhouse. After a few minutes he flew away with mom in pursuit - it was a pretty tentative flight headed toward the neighbors yard. Here is a photo of him on the porch. Now I think there may be two babies left - we will see who leaves next....