To say we love an English garden style wedding look would be an understatement.
When creating flowers for a wedding or event, first we focus on whats in season. One of the many (many!) things I love about garden flowers, especially garden roses in particular, is the fact they're available year round. We ship in roses from small California farms and the vibrant colors they come in are absolutely amazing. Need the exact blush shade? Or a perfect peach? Or head in the opposite direction with a mood burgundy, there's a rose for whatever the color palette is.
I think using garden-style florals, which to me is any type of flower that opens up really beautifully- looks like you just cut it from an actual garden, are great for any aspect of a wedding or event. We use them in bouquets (love), centerpieces, installations, arches, etc- haha, basically everywhere?
So here are a couple of our favorite ways to add that lush, gorgeous garden party aesthetic into your wedding or event.
English Garden Bouquets
lush garden style bouquet of pale blues, golden garden roses and neutrals
garden roses, ranunculus, blue tweedia and snap dragon; photography by Mo Davis
Bouquets are one of my favorite things to make. Creating a color palette, working with the design and picking gorgeous garden flowers never fails to reminds me how much I love what I do.
We use local floral farms and have some of our flowers shipped in from farms in California. If we need vibrant dahlias for a bouquet, we have a farm in Michigan that grows beautiful hothouse dahlias year round!
natural, organic style garden bouquet of neutrals, burgundy and toffee
dahlias, garden roses, spray garden roses and jasmine vine; photography by Mo Davis
When going for an English garden style bouquet, we choose larger florals that really open up- like garden roses and peonies. They have a higher petal count (to get all florist technical talk) and we prep them before your event to get them to open to their fullest.
Featured here on Martha Stewart Weddings
organic, garden handheld bouquet of neutrals, sand and toffee
garden roses, peonies, cosmos and spirea; photography by Mo Davis
In addition to choose larger, more garden style florals, we love to add detail with accent pieces to create texture and a little life to each bouquet. Above, since it was in the summer season, we added sprigs of white spirea instead of greenery to add a little color and break up all the roses in the bouquet. You get a more organic, less traditional wedding shape.
Featured here on Wedding Chicks
vibrant and moody jewel tone garden bouquet
garden roses, ranunculus, anemones and orchids
I had just made this bouquet in the studio and loved how the colors and textures played off each other. We had garden roses shipped in from our fave California farm and I love the look they created with the dark mauve orchids, violet ranunculus and softness of the white anemones. Playing around with texture creates a more interesting style of bouquet silhouette.
neutral and natural, lush garden style bouquet
garden roses, delphinium, ranunculus and Queen Anne's lace; photography by Mo Davis
We create a lot of neutral bouquets here at Leaf + Petal and you would probably think it would be difficult to give each one a life and identity of their own. First, look into what's in season and looking its best. Next we look at the overall style of your wedding- going natural with an outdoor event? Or maybe a more formal country club affair? Every event has a different feel, just like every person holding a bouquet is different.
For the base of this bouquet, I went with a more organic garden flower- Delphinium- to give it more body and a farm style feel. I was only going to use florals and create texture from the different flowers used but last minute chopped some of this really gorgeous burgundy greenery I walked by on the street (thanks neighbor).
featured here on Wedding Sparrow
English Garden Floral Wedding Arch
lush garden gazebo at the Elms Mansion
Elms Mansion New Orleans, photography by Mo Davis
I was pursuing Instagram (all the time) and my favorite florist in England had created the most lush, over-the-top gazebo florals. I stopped dead in my tracks/feed. I knew I wanted to re-create this in our own Leaf + Petal style. I love florals that look like they are growing where place them, creating a natural looking, but made by L+P garden.
When we create an English Garden wedding aesthetic, we tend to go for a really natural look, like you could just walk up and pluck a stem.
mixed pinks garden flower wall
Beauregard Keyes House, French Quarter New Orleans; photography by Mo Davis
Its fun to think outside the box when creating a garden style ceremony space. At Leaf + Petal NOLA, we have tons of arches, etc, to choose from but we always love incorporating florals into structures already in place, like Beauregard Keyes Courtyard above, or the Ritz Carlton below.
The arches above had tons of gorgeous lush jasmine growing so we just added tons of garden roses and peonies to give it some color and vibrancy.
organic neutrals with trailing greens gazebo ceremony flowers
Ritz Carlton New Orleans; photography by Sydney Baye; candles by Luminous Events
Gazebos covered in growing, trailing florals is a personal fave. Nothing screams garden to me like a gazebo. Here we created an intimate ceremony space with trailing garden roses and greenery which post-ceremony was flipped to a lounge space.
We added aisle markers in the form of small hedges to enhance that garden wedding look. Almost like they're growing up from the chairs.
Oh, and always add tons of candles. Ambiance maker right there.
English garden industrial warehouse wedding
Warehouse of Lovegood, New Orleans; photography by Lance Nicoll
First off, I'm biased by this wedding because it was mine. I wanted to create something lush and garden-y to offset the industrial setting of the warehouse. We went light and airy with accents of neutral and blush.
Featured here on Martha Stewart Weddings.
English Garden Style Centerpieces
overflowing garden style lounge centerpiece
Beauregard Keyes House, New Orleans; photography by Mo Davis
This is one of my fave centerpieces we've ever created. We mixed garden roses, farm cut cafe au last dinner plate dahlias, and more farm style florals like snapdragon and pee-gee hydrangeas with light accents of jasmine.
Lush, almost overblown roses have become a signature of our work at Leaf + Petal NOLA. We leave our roses out of the cooler til they have that 'just picked from a garden look'.
lush pale blues, golden honey garden roses and neutrals
White Oaks Fields Blueberry Farm, Loranger, LA; photography by Mo Davis
Playing with colors and texture when working with flowers can help create a signature look. For a seated intimate dinner on a blueberry/honey farm in rural Lousiana, we played up the blues and golden hues to accent the gorgeous gold and navy details designed by Michelle Norwood.
Since the event was outdoors on a boring farm, we wanted to mirror the natural look but not too messy with greenery. We focused on the garden flowers to bring the natural aesthetic.
lush, garden organic table arrangements
Il Mercato, New Orleans; photography by Mo Davis
When going for a more natural look, I love to nix the vases. Creating little bundles of florals that sit table top, nestled in with candles creates a more intimate aesthetic, perfect for this courtyard event. It's more relaxed in style, less traditional wedding.
intimate seated dinner, garden party style
Il Mercato, New Orleans; photography by Mo Davis
For an intimate seated dinner in the courtyard at Il Mercato in the Lower Garden District of New Orleans, we decided to go with a garden party look. We mixed with brass candle sticks by House of Modern Vintage NOLA and textured pillows and bamboo chairs from Lovegood Rentals.
Featured here on Wedding Chicks
Natural, Garden Party Installations
flower wall installations coupled with an intimate seated dinner
Warehouse of Lovegood, Bywater, New Orleans; photography by Lance Nicoll and rentals by Lovegood Rentals
While florals play a huge part in creating an English garden wedding style ambiance, all the details play together to create an overall aesthetic. For my wedding, we wanted an industrial space but with overgrown florals, sophisticated details but with a relaxed, intimate feel.
We mixed lush garden roses and cafe au lait dahlias with tons of candles and blue and white china from House of Modern Vintage NOLA. Lovegood used tons of mahogany warmed up the space and the layered antique rugs created a less formal space.
Those are a couple of my fave ways to create a lush English garden feel for your wedding and event. Check out our portfolio for tons more inspo!