Check out the progress in the Studio…

Since we live in Illinois and our climate is too harsh for year-round growing, I usually order all of my flowers through a wholesaler (Kennicott Brothers) so it was hard to imagine how large a growing operation would have to be to sell a given item to me and thousands of other florists on a daily basis. It just seems like the flowers would have to run out or something–which is certainly not the case as I know now!

Mellano & Co. were currently growing an assortment of foliage including myrtle and eucalyptus as well as flowers like solidago, asters, and one of my all-time favorites–ranunculus!!! They change out their beds seasonally and hand-pick flowers daily for distribution mainly to California as well as surrounding states but also out here to us! I actually just used their myrtle in my vintage Christmas holiday shoot a few weeks ago!

I am so glad that my friend Tim at Kennicott’s set up this tour of the fields and operations of Mellano & Co. for me and that Mike kind enough to show us around. I may just be a small, independent wedding & event florist, but I really have a passion for this industry and its nice to see where & how our flowers are grown.

Here are some photos from Mellano’s website showing the fields, picking, and packaging process…

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Crystal’s bouquet was a stunning, fluffy mix of peonies, hydrangea, lisianthus, champagne sweetheart roses, and white mini cymbidium orchids with a handle wrapped in champagne satin, raffia and pearl accents. The bridesmaids all carried bouquets of white and green hydrangea, green hypericum berries and green mini cymbidium orchids. The bouts and corsages were made of a combination of orchids and sweetheart roses.

For the ceremony, we made a swirl pattern of petals down the aisle and designed the 2-sided programs.

For the reception, we designed the Pennsylvania Dance cards, menus, table numbers, candy buffet signs and seating chart.

The centerpieces we did were in cobalt blue vases and had ivory ribbon and monograms attached to them. They were filled with hydrangea, dianthus, Bells of Ireland, Delphinium, artichokes and orchids. The bride and her grandmother made the other centerpieces which were lanterns with candles and silk orchids in them.

It was a beautiful wedding and we were glad to be a part of it. I am so glad Cynthia of Everlasting Elegant Wedding suggested that we be the florist! It was a huge success!

Congrats Mr. and Mrs. Hoffert!

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The flowers in the blue vase were bay leaves, pittosporum, roses, hydrangea, ranunculus, curly willow and tulips. The blue vase is vintage and we found it at an antique store. The vase is similar to those often referred to as “end of the day glass” that my mother-in-law collects so that was the main part of the gift–the flowers were a secondary bonus!

The flowers in the purple vase were for our favorite neighbors, Kevin & Jamie. Kevin saw me loading the car with wedding flowers this past week and asked if I could design something special for his wife for Mother’s Day. I had a lot of pink and purple flowers so I came up with this lovely arrangement–and I am into lace right now, so I wrapped some around the vase for an added accent.

Both arrangements were well-received (and well-deserved) by these great Mothers!

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I hope all the mothers out there had a great Mother’s Day! New to the mom club is our own Monica Simpson, whose daughter Annabelle Lucille was born yesterday morning. Both mom and baby are healthy and happy. Congrats to MOMica and Andrew on their first baby!

For the personal flowers, I created a bouquet for Laura that had champagne roses and sweets, some pink roses and tulips and ivory double tulips with a base of antique pink hydrangea. The handle was wrapped in a remnant of the bridal gown fabric and had a really unique pearl detail down it. The bridesmaids carried tulip and rose bouquets with a white hydrangea base wrapped in remnants from their dresses. The bouts and corsages were made with roses and tulips to match everything else.

For the ceremony, I just had to provide an ivory non-monogrammed aisle runner and 2 parent flowers. Laura and Josh lucked out and got a free arch to get married under since the couple getting married after them had already paid for it and their florist wanted to set it up early.

For the reception, I did vases for bouquets and petals on the head table along with votives and a toss bouquet. The cake was decorated with white and ivory roses and 3 monogram letters. The centerpieces were submerged tulips with floating candles on top. Half of them were pink 16″ size cylinders and the other were white 12″ size cylinders. Every table was accented with petals to make it more lush.

I love working at Venuti’s and we had yet another successful wedding there!

Congrats to Laura and Josh!
It was a pleasure doing your wedding flowers!

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I did this by making 3 little oases and 2 vased arrangements. They each contained a variety of ethereal, natural looking materials both dried and fresh. Dried materials included curly willow and birch branches as well as cattails.  The fresh materials included 2 varieties of lily grass, viburnum, agapanthus, veronica, hypericum berries, and Queen Anne’s Lace. Other accessories like rocks, moss and teal beach glass completed the look.

I am sure that Lindsay was very surprised to see such unusual but perfectly befitting arrangements at her second shower. I will post photos from the actual shower itself soon!

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