A Bottled Bouquet & Corked Boutonniere

Wedding Planning

After all, what would you expect from a wine-themed wedding?

Using wine bottles as vases–either as is or cut down–is nothing new, especially not here on the ‘Bee. I’d figured pretty early on that I’d have a bottle-vase on the altar to place my bouquet in since I wouldn’t have an attendant to hand it off to–it was one of the first decisions I made about my bouquet, next to the given that I’d make it myself. Then, back when I was cutting down the bottles for the centerpieces and all I started to think about what the top part of the bottles resembled.

Here’s a hint. This:

FloraCraft Gala Bouquet Holder | image via Amazon.com

FloraCraft Gala Bouquet Holder | image via Amazon.com

Is not all that dissimilar to this:

 

Wine Bottle Bouquet Handle & Vase/Stand

Wine Bottle Bouquet Handle & Vase/Stand

And when prettied up like below it looks a lot less bar-brawl-ish!

jwalker_ttb_bouquet_reclining

So far I’ve yet to find an online occurrence of a wine bottle being used as a bouquet handle so I’m going to go out on a limb and posit that I may have actually come up with something new–at least as far as Google Image Search can determine. (Of course, as soon as I type those words I’m sure someone will prove me wrong–that’s okay, I’m not counting on it being anything but what I want.)

To assemble my bouquet, I started by making small bunches of my different elements beginning with larger groupings around the more limited wooden flowers and then smaller bunches to fill in and fill out the rest of the bouquet, wrapping everything together with floral tape.

jwalker_ttb_bunchesinprogress

The first go-round the bouquet was forming up too round for my tastes, so I ended up pulling everything out, grabbing another piece of Styrofoam, and starting over. While I was happier with the placement of the flowers the second time around it was still coming out rather round and I’ve made my peace with it. The fact that the flowers are placed forward and out rather than oriented sky-ward help it not look quite so broccoli-headed. I’ve also left the back rather flat so that it’s not cumbersome to hold out in front of me.

jwalker_ttb_mixedmediabouquet

As for T’s boutonniere, I used a small cluster of a maroon flower, a star anise pod, and a tiny adding machine-tape rose and nestled it in a channel cut into the back of a champagne cork. Backed with a fabric grape leaf (leftover from one of the clusters I used on the centerpieces) and wrapped with a piece of grosgrain ribbon it was done.

jwalker_ttb_boutonniere

 

Instead of counting on a corsage pin to hold this guy in place I’m opting for a regular pin-back. After placing it rear and center on the cork and having the flowers flop unceremoniously forward, I repositioned it higher up behind the flower instead: problem solved. Always good to do a test-run, you know?

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