Congratulations! Someone you love dearly is getting married! Yippee! Woo hoo! Wait a second. Pump the breaks for just a minute. Before we get to the actual wedding, there are about a million decisions for a couple to make in the days, weeks or even years leading up to the big day. There are questions upon about where it will be, who is invited, what table linens, what song to play for the first dance, what shoes to wear, and on and on and on.
For some couples, even if they enjoy the process, the act of planning a wedding can become overwhelming. There are approximately one million decisions to make. It is easy to become so consumed with the business of wedding planning – and let’s be real, it is a business – that it can blind him/her/they to what really matters – each other.
This is where engagement parties come in. They are a wonderful celebration of the betrothed couple for which they themselves do not have to handle any of the decision making unless they want to. They are allowed to simply show up and be together with their friends and family without pressure or expectations. It gives them space to breath and actually celebrate with those closest to them. Engagement parties can be as big or small and as fancy or casual as you or they would like.
Now, seeing as how you are reading this on the website of an event floral designer… I am sure you can see where this blog post is going, one of the decisions you, as the host, of an engagement party will need to make is flowers. For engagement parties, I love the idea of just having fun with it and using it as a way to reflect the couple's tastes. If the couple enjoys bright colors, then play with that. We can create fun table arrangements with amazing texture in shades of blue, fuschia, coral, orange and yellow. It sounds crazy, I know, but it in a garden style arrangement with simple vessels, it somehow works.
Does the couple prefer a more classic style? Then you cannot go wrong with a cream and green color palette. Cream roses, peonies, lilies, lisianthus, and dahlias with gorgeous greenery are a beautiful combination that never goes out of style.
Beyond color palettes, selecting flower arrangements can be guided by a variety of other factors. With venues ranging from backyards to formal dining rooms, the setting of the engagement party can and should also help to guide the style of flower arrangements. For example, what works aesthetically in a barn could potentiallhy look out of place in the private room of a fine-dining restaurant and vice versa.
As the host, you get to decide whether to go big with large centerpieces or keep it simple with bud vases. You can even include the couple's favorite flower for an extra personal touch. The bloom can be integrated into a centerpiece or used as the focal point in a single flower type arrangement.
As varied as engagement parties are, really anything goes when it comes to the floral arrangements. The best part is that there are no rules to follow or expectations to be met. And seeing as how the whole point of the engagement party is to CELEBRATE the happy couple, the only requests that I make of you is that you have fun and you stop and smell the flowers, of course.
