Planning on being a summer bride? Here's expert advice about how to throw a white-hot wedding.
By: Sharon NaylorKeeping Flowers Fresh
16. On a hot day, beware of your summer wedding flowers wilting quickly. Sometimes, they’re droopy when they reach you, having suffered during shipment from the floral store to your location. So ask your floral designer to transport your flowers with extra attention paid to their water sources, such as setting all the bouquets upright in a container with a few inches of water for the stems to drink from [you would need to make sure that your bouquet handles are wrapped in such a way—such as just around the middle of the gathered stems—so that cut stems are exposed at the bottom to drink up water, not fully covered by satin ribbon. Or choose single-stem flowers as both a budget idea and as a more realistic plan to keep flowers fresh and cool.
17. Choose your summer wedding flowers well for their water source ability. For instance, hydrangea is a lovely summer flower, but it wilts in minutes without a good water source, so floral designers advise you to keep the hydrangea out of your bouquet and off of your groom’s lapel, instead placing sprigs in little, water-filled vases on each table.
18. Keep your summer wedding flowers ultra-cool before the ceremony, perhaps popping all of your bouquets into the refrigerator between the pre-wedding photos and when you depart for the ceremony. And don’t spritz centerpiece flowers with water for outdoor settings, since direct sunlight will burn that water right off the bloom and turn your flowers brown. Ask for summertime-sturdy flowers and an efficient water source for all of your flowers, so that they keep their strength and look stunning throughout the event.
19. Store your tossing summer wedding bouquet in the site’s refrigerator or in a cooler you bring with you, so that it’s not sitting in the heat, losing its moisture and color.
20. Decide on a Plan B for later-in-the-day photos. Often, wedding photographers will bring you outside for additional couple photos while the dancing is going on, so look carefully at your summer wedding bouquet before you bring it into the frame with you. If all the flowers are droopy, dry and damaged from the heat, just leave it out of the frame and pose without it. Digital cameras capture every detail, and you don’t want to wind up with the horrible surprise of ‘those flowers are dead’ when you get your fabulous couple kiss-shot photos and see the damage in hi-resolution. So be sure to look closely and make the styling decision of whether or not to have the blooms in the shot with you.
