February Wedding at Woodbridge Hill Hideaway

February Wedding at Woodbridge Hill Hideaway

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February is one of the most popular months for weddings in Tasmania, with summer being in full swing.  I am mostly booked out for February every year but with this wedding, the lovely bride was super organised.   She booked almost 2 years in advance and we had plenty of time to plan and look forward to the big day!

Woodbridge Hill Hideaway

The wedding was held at Woodbridge Hill Hideaway,  high up in the hills behind Woodbridge to the south of Hobart.  The venue has spectacular views, and on a clear day you can see for hundreds of kilometres towards the east.  

The bride was after pink, green and cream with a rustic feel.  February can be a changeable month with flowers, depending on how long the summer lingers for.  This season, I had plenty of lovely rich pinks and reds to choose from.

For the brides bouquet, a rich wine-coloured Banksia Praemorsa was the central flower.  Each bouquet had a Pink Ice Protea, some rich pinky red Banksia Occidentalis, and some gorgeous green and red Hydrangea.

I added Brunia Albiflora to each bouquet too.  It's purplish brown-grey tones were lovely peeping out from amongst all the colour.  Some newly planted green leucadendrons called Orientale were added too.  They are a great soft green with burgundy tips and tinge.  

I also added some sedum, echinacea, and hebe.  The foliage used was Risdon Peppermint and Pittosportum, with some Hebe seed heads which I love to use in bouquets.  

Such beautiful rich pinks!  

Hair comb for the bride

A fresh flower hair slide for the bride used more Hyrdrangea, Sedum, Pittosporum and Peppermint, with a Banksia Occindentalis, Brunia, Hebe and wax flower.

  Beautiful on that gorgeous dark hair.  

For table decorations, there were lots of little wooden boxed arrangements.  

Each centrepiece had a Protea Pink Ice, Brunia, Banksia Occidentalis, Silver Tree and lots of leucadendrons, foliage and texture.  

So pretty and fresh!

Larger boxed arrangements to decorate the venue had more Hyrdangea, Banksia Praemorsa, Protea Pink Ice, Banksia Occidentalis, Brunia, some dried Silver Tree cones and some summer grasses.  

I really enjoyed the colour and texture combinations in these boxed arrangements and centrepieces.

I love the dusky pink of the Banksai Praemorsa in this one.  Rustic, pink, and pretty.

Corsages for the mums.

For the mums and grandmas, there were sweet little corsages.

The men's boutonnieres

And for the men, boutonniere using Brunia and a range of foliages.  

Woodbridge Hill Hideaway

It was such a treat to be involved in the wedding of this lovely couple.  I wish them all the best for their future together.  

January Wedding at Bangor Wine and Oyster Shed

January Wedding at Bangor Wine and Oyster Shed

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Early January, and the first wedding of the new year was at Bangor Wine and Oyster Shed at the northern tip of the Tasman Peninsula area in Dunalley.  Bangor is is a stunning spot, on a hill surrounded by vineyards with water views in seemingly every direction.

Bangor Wine and Oyster Shed

Bangor is known for exceptional quality local produce, so any wedding celebration would be sure to please the guests! Its location is really special too - another reason many people choose to travel to Tasmania to tie the knot.  

The bride was going for a vintage/bohemian look with the colours of sage green, champagne and ivory.   Such a gorgeous, subtle palette.  Protea White Ice flower throughout the year here in Tasmania and in summer they tend to be more champagne coloured, with are darker central mass.  I built the design around these proteas.  

The Brunia Albiflora were ready picking earlier than usual this year, so I was able to use them with their soft grey-green tones.  Each bouquet also had a hydrangea variety called Paniculata in a white and green colouring.  Maui Sunset Leucadendron are a gorgeous mix of olive and grass green tones with pink tips in summer. They were scattered through.  I also used some old-gold Banksia Formosa (formally Dryandra Formosa)   They added a warmth and richness to the mix.

Soft and beautiful flowering gum in an off-white were used, as well as gum nuts, still green,  from a Corymbia.  I also used some Leucadendron Discolour and their cones.  The last few remaining Berzelia can be seen peeping out from each bouquet too.  They are usually all gone before January so it was a treat to be able to add them.

Foliages were really important for these bouquets.  I used some silvery grey-green Eucalyptus Crenulata, as well as some Risdon Peppermint.  

Branches covered in little lime green seed pods were foraged from a native plant growing at my local beach.  They were prolific in producing seeds this season and the colour and texture was so beautiful!  Also foraged were some local ferns.  Fishbone Water Fern are at their best after the new leaves have hardened off.  

I also used native Coral Fern which I love using in bouquets.  It sits so well around the edges of the bouquet.  

The groom had a combination of foliages - the Crenulata, Coral Fern and foraged seed pods (I haven't been able to find a name for them yet!) along with some of the last Berzelia, a Leucadendron Discolour and a green Corymbia gum nut.  

The rest of the boutonnieres followed the theme!

  

For decorating the venue, I did some large urns with lots of texture.  I used white hydrangeas, tea tree, fluffy white flowering gum, and some Berzelia.

Leucadendron Discolour, green with a pink blush, Pink Ice Protea, and Brunia Albiflora were the larger flowers.  The cones are the beautiful dried cones from the Leucadendron Silver Tree.  They are such beautiful things!

I also added more Hydrangea Paniculata too.  The greens included the native Fishbone Fern, Eucalyptus Crenulata, the foraged seed pods, and the gorgeous draping Coral Fern.  

I really enjoyed the colour scheme of this wedding - pared back and subtle and packed with interesting textures and shapes.  As always, a pleasure to be involved!

Late March Wedding

Late March Wedding

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March is a great month for a wedding in Tasmania.  The days are still warm but the autumn rains have usually begun meaning that the tired summer grass is refreshed and the landscape starts to green up again.  In March 2016, I provided flowers for a wedding in Northern Tasmania.  March is great for native flowers too.  The flowers that are blooming have a fresh, autumn glow the combinations of colours and textures can be so beautiful.

Wanting soft pinks, greens and creams, I was able to use one of my favourite late summer flowers, the Banksia Baxterii.  It is a creamy white banksia also called the Birdsnest Banksia because of its shape. I teamed it with a Protea White Ice, a gorgeous creamy white protea that in autumn has a purplish tinge to its centre. 

Flowering Brunia Albiflora, with the "berries" completely covered by their flowers was also one of the focal flowers, with 2 Protea Compacta in clear pink either side.   I love the leaves of the Banksia Baxterii which you can see in this photo.  They are a striking zig zag shape which add to the structure of the the design.

Flowering lemon-scented tea tree foliage, blue Eucalyptus Risdonii foliage and the purplish silver swirls of Leucadendron Galpinii were some of the foliages used.  A few early green leucadendrons and some silvery grey gum nuts were the final ingredients. 

For the groom, I used a Banksia Baxterii leaf with its strong zig zag shape.  It was softened with more blue eucalyptus foliage, some flowering tea tree and a fine, yellow-green leucadendron.  A gum nut and  some Brunia Albiflora 'berries' in flower were also used.  

Boutonnieres look great all lined up!  I loved using these special little gum nuts. 

I really enjoyed using the super-fresh autumn natives to create this bouquet - its a pleasure to work with blooms that are looking their best.  

Stonefield Wedding in Autumn

Stonefield Wedding in Autumn

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The colour theme for this mid-March wedding at Stonefield in Brighton, was neutrals.  The bride loved lots of interesting texture without the strong colour so I began collecting my ideas for this wedding by selecting the foliages.   Foliage is such an important part of a bouquet.  It can make such a difference to a design.  I began with a palette of blue-green foliages in different shapes and sizes.  In Autumn, the Eucalyptus Cordata, a beautiful spicy-fragranced blue leafed gum, was budding and just beginning to flower so it was a must.  I also used Tasmanian myrtle beech foliage - small glossy deep green leaves sitting prettily on stems that fan out.   I also used Irish Juniper - a beautiful variegated fine-leafed Juniper that is a tad prickly.  I forgive it because I love the blue green colour and texture it adds.  And finally for foliage, I used a beautiful blue-green cyprus that has a lovely bend to its branches.  

Each bouquet also contained Protea Pink Ice, and Protea White Ice as focal flowers.  Some garden grown hydrangeas in subtle whites and green with little flecks of pink added to the foliagy effect.  Some Leucadendron Gandogerii in its green, pre-flowering phase were also used.  It had lovely bronzey-pink tips 

  Among other ingredients I used, were pittosporum berries in a green and white variegated form and  some gorgeous green gum nuts from Corymbia Ficifolia.  At the back on the right, you can also see a Silver Tree cone, the fruit from the female Silver Tree, which is a Leucadendron often grown for its magnificent foliage.  The cones are stunning silvery velvety balls ranging from golf-ball to base-ball size.  The are a beautiful and unusual addition to a bouquet.

Another textural ingredient was Brunia Albiflora which is often seen before it flowers with its beautiful silvery grey balls.  In March it is flowering, so there are lots of tiny white flowers covering each of the balls opening from the outside-in and forming a fluffy white ring around each one.

Even though there is colour involved, the overall blend has a neutral look and the emphasis is on the texture of the bouquets.  

For the boutonnieres, I used green gum nuts.  I love using gum nuts in wedding flowers and they are quite versatile because you can use them at so many stages of their growth from flower right through to mature, dried woody nut.  These green ones are last years fruit that haven't yet aged to a woody exterior.  They're not always available, depending on the time of year.  

The gum nuts were teamed with a leaf from their mother tree, the Corymbia Ficifolia.  It has large leathery gum leaves that work well for the back of a boutonniere.  I also added some Irish Juniper and some pittosporum berries.  The groom stood out with the addition of some E. Cordata blooms in creamy white.

Stonefield - beautiful photography by Fred and Hannah

Stonefield is a beautiful venue!  The bride and groom opted for doing their own table decorations and paid for a selection of flowers that worked with their theme.

It's always lovely to pack a boot full of flowers!  Lots of Protea Pink Ice, at their best in Autumn, Eucalyptus, Myrtle Beech,  flowering Brunia, Leucadendron Silver Tree and some of the other bits and pieces from the bouquets - all ready to play with.

Stonefield - beautiful photography by Fred and Hannah

The reception Venue at Stonefield has an abundance of glass, making the most of the gorgeous gardens.

Stonefield, Brighton Tasmania

It's always nice to see pictures of how it all turned out!

I really loved the opportunity of creating these texture-rich bouquets.  It was a privilege, as always, to be involved in such a special day.