Aoife & Laurence's Wedding

Aoife and Laurence’s wedding was an incredibly memorable event for us.  We don’t usually cater for weddings at Christmas due to fluctuations with deliveries and flower supply, but seeing as it was Aoife, I just couldn’t say no!

Aoife and I met through business.  She dropped into the shop one day to ask if we’d like to do a shared promotion with her business, Amari Lane beauty salon, in Killester.  We thought it was a great idea!  One thing led to another and soon we discovered that we had more in common than just businesses in the same location.  It turned out we both also had ties to Kilmuckridge, Co. Wexford.  Pretty soon we were good friends; she did my nails and I supplied her flowers.

When she asked us to cater for her Christmas wedding, we knew we were going to have to get really creative to ensure we could find flowers for her big day.  Luckily, Aoife’s brief helped us out.  She wanted a very rustic, down to earth wedding, with the special request of using a lot of mixed greenery from her farm near Kilmuckridge, where they had just built their new home.  I usually spend Christmas in Kilmuckridge, so together we came up with a plan - to create her wedding in my kitchen!

As it turned out, we ended up having the most fantastic time, starting out with a foraging session on her farm to select whatever enticing seasonal foliage the countryside had to offer us!  We added a few items from the shop, but managed to keep 90% of the ingredients organic and sourced from the local area.

When Aoife’s special day arrived, we decorated the pew ends with informal clusters of foliage heavily interspersed with bright red and midnight blue viburnum berries, tied together with a broad cranberry coloured ribbon, the perfect contrast to the deep green foliage.

Aoife looked beautiful in her incredible dress, so elegant in its simplicity, with layers of chiffon under the A line skirt and an intricate design of crystals and pearls at the waistline.

The bride and bridesmaids’ bouquets were the highlight of the flowers on the day.  We created large bouquets with a loose formation, combining a range of blues and greens which complimented the bridesmaids’ emerald dresses, and tied them together with the same cranberry coloured ribbon to match Aoife’s mother’s dress.

Azure thistles and indigo viburnum provided the blue tones, and we used plenty of silvery, sea green eucalyptus to blend them in with an assortment of deep green foliage, including rosemary, ivy and fern.  We also added a touch of burgundy leucodendron as a highlight to echo the cranberry of the ribbon.

We created buttonholes in the same style, using deep green foliage with thistles and leucodendron as an eye-catching feature.  Laurence and the father of the bride looked very dapper in their black tuxedos and bow ties!

The venue for the reception was the wonderful Rathsallagh House in Wicklow, who provided an incredible dining room that absolutely sparkled even in mid-winter, with it’s bright white decor and fabulous silver ceiling drapes.  We created a long and low table arrangement in keeping with our theme, using plenty of greenery and three white candles.

The cake was a simple, three tiers with white icing, adorned with the same cranberry ribbon, and holly to echo our local foliage theme.

Thank you so much to Aoife and Laurence for asking us to do your wedding flowers.  We had a ball!

Here’s what Aoife had to say about our wedding service:

“If you are looking for a wedding florist look no further!!  Lilla and Kasia arranged the flowers for my wedding on New Year’s Eve last year and I was absolutely delighted with them.  We had a consultation with them and they had some amazing ideas and knew exactly what I wanted.  I wanted to incorporate foliage from the farm where I live and that was not an issue!  Our top table piece and pew ends were gorgeous and got so many compliments. Our bouquets were beautiful and the lads loved the buttonholes!  Thanks so much Lilla, Kasia (and Stephen ☺️)”

Photography by richardgavin.com