DIY wedding flowers or a florist: what the work really involves before you decide

The honest answer before you buy a single bucket

You can do your own wedding flowers, and for a small wedding with simple designs it can go well. But nearly all of the work lands in the two or three days before the wedding, it needs cool space, buckets, tools and several helpers, and it competes with everything else you have to do that week. Many couples end up happiest with a hybrid: a florist handles the bouquets, boutonnieres and ceremony pieces that are hard to get right, and family members make simple table arrangements.

I have designed wedding flowers at Willow Creek Florist in Dallas since 1988, from bridal showers and rehearsal dinners to ceremonies and receptions. This guide is meant to help you decide with a clear picture of what the work really is, before the flowers are ordered.

Count the pieces before you count the cost

Most people picture a bouquet and a few centerpieces. A real list is longer, and every item has to be made, kept fresh and delivered to the right place at the right time. Write your own list before deciding anything, because the number of pieces is what turns a fun project into a second job.

Even a modest wedding often adds up to dozens of individual pieces, and the personal flowers, the ones people wear and carry, are the most delicate of all.

Then mark each piece with where it needs to be and when. Bouquets go to wherever the wedding party is getting dressed, often hours before the ceremony. Boutonnieres must be pinned on before photos. Ceremony flowers may need to move to the reception afterward. That map of times and places is what a florist manages on the day, and it is what you will be managing if you do it yourself.

• Bridal bouquet, plus bouquets for each bridesmaid
• Boutonnieres for the groom, groomsmen, fathers and grandfathers
• Corsages or wrist flowers for mothers and grandmothers
• Ceremony arrangements, an arch or backdrop, and aisle flowers
• Reception centerpieces, a head table, the cake and the welcome table
• Flowers for the rehearsal dinner and the shower, if you are hosting them

The timeline that never appears on a mood board

Flowers for a wedding are ordered in advance and arrive a few days before the date, so they have time to drink and open. When they arrive, every stem has to be processed: unwrapped, stripped of leaves below the waterline, recut and put into clean water with flower food, which is the routine Penn State Extension recommends for any cut flower. For a wedding, that can mean hundreds of stems in one afternoon.

Design happens the day before. Centerpieces and ceremony pieces come first, bouquets and boutonnieres last, because they are handled most and must look perfect in photographs hours later. On the wedding day, someone has to load everything carefully, drive it to the venue, set it up, fix anything that shifted, and later take it all down and clear the containers.

Timing is unforgiving because cut flowers never stop losing water. Susan Han of the University of Massachusetts, in her extension article on handling cut flowers, notes that once harvested, flowers continue to transpire and will wilt rapidly, and that temperature management is the most critical factor for their quality. A bouquet made too early, or left in a warm car, pays the price.

Cold space, buckets and the logistics people forget

Han's article explains that most cut flowers keep their quality best when stored near freezing, which is why florists work from walk-in coolers. A home refrigerator full of food for the out-of-town relatives is not that. And it is worse than crowded: ripening fruit gives off ethylene, which Han notes can harm sensitive flowers even in tiny amounts, so flowers should not share a shelf with the fruit tray.

Some flowers must stay out of the cold entirely. Han lists anthurium, bird of paradise, heliconia and certain orchids among the flowers that develop chilling injury below 50 degrees Fahrenheit. A garage is no solution in a Dallas summer, and the back seat of a car in the sun is worse.

Then there are the supplies: clean buckets, sharp knives and clippers, flower food, containers for every centerpiece, ribbon, pins, floral tape and the mechanics that hold an arch arrangement in place. All of it has to be bought, stored, carried to the venue and carried home again.

Where DIY works and where it usually goes wrong

Some pieces are well within reach of a careful amateur. Others depend on technique, structure and timing that take years to learn, and those are the ones that show in every photograph.

If you are set on doing it yourself, put your energy into the easy column and hand the hard column to someone who does it every week.

• Easier: bud vases with one or two stems on each reception table
• Easier: greenery runners and loose, low centerpieces
• Easier: flowers for the shower or rehearsal dinner
• Harder: the bridal bouquet, which has to be balanced, comfortable to hold and fresh for hours
• Harder: boutonnieres and corsages, which wilt fastest because they are out of water all day
• Harder: arches, installations and large ceremony pieces that must be secure and safe

Comparing the true cost of each route

The appeal of DIY is the price of the flowers alone. The full comparison includes extra stems to cover breakage and blooms that do not open, containers and supplies, the cooler space you may have to rent or improvise, and the hours of every person helping. It also includes the risk: if the hydrangeas collapse the night before, there is no shop to call that can replace them at the last minute.

A florist's price includes design labor, but it also includes buying from growers at trade volume, conditioning every stem properly, storing everything at the right temperature, delivering, setting up and clearing away. For a large wedding, that difference in waste and risk often narrows the gap more than couples expect. My guide to what drives the price of custom flowers explains the factors that move the number either way.

The hybrid plan many couples end up loving

You do not have to choose all or nothing. The plans I see work best split the job by difficulty and by how visible each piece is.

One common split: the florist makes the bouquets, boutonnieres, corsages and ceremony flowers, and a team of family and friends arranges simple bud vases or low centerpieces for the reception using flowers the florist conditions and delivers in buckets. Another: the florist handles the wedding day, and the couple does the shower and rehearsal dinner flowers themselves, where a casual look is part of the charm. A third: the florist designs one sample centerpiece, and helpers replicate it the day before with flowers chosen to be forgiving.

Any of these keeps the personal flowers in professional hands while saving where the eye forgives a little imperfection.

If you do take it on, a checklist that prevents disasters

Couples who pull off their own flowers well tend to treat it like a small production, with a plan, a rehearsal and a leader. These are the habits that separate a calm day-before from a frantic one.

• Do a practice bouquet and centerpiece weeks ahead with the same flowers
• Choose hardy, forgiving varieties over delicate ones
• Order extra stems to cover breakage and flowers that do not open
• Recruit helpers, and name one person in charge who is not the bride or groom
• Process stems as soon as they arrive, and keep everything cool and away from fruit
• Make bouquets and boutonnieres last, and keep them in water until the last moment
• Assign someone to deliver, set up and take everything down

Heat, care and the questions to ask next

An outdoor ceremony changes the plan, because Texas heat shortens the life of any flower out of water. If your wedding is outside between late spring and early fall, read my guide to choosing flowers that hold up in Texas heat before you order anything. And for keeping the centerpieces looking good through a weekend of brunches and gift openings, the steps in making fresh flowers last apply just as well to wedding flowers.

Before you commit either way, ask yourself three questions. Who, specifically, will be processing flowers on Thursday and building centerpieces on Friday, and are they also needed for the rehearsal, hair appointments and airport runs? Where will several buckets of flowers stay cool for two or three days? And who will collect the containers and clean up at the end of the night, when everyone else is celebrating?

If those answers come easily, DIY may suit you well. If they do not, that is useful information too, and it usually points toward handing at least the personal flowers to a professional.

How a wedding works when we handle the flowers

When we do a wedding, we work with you from the first consultation through the event itself. We start with your style, your colors, the venue, the season and your budget, and then design the pieces around that vision, from the bridal shower and rehearsal dinner to the ceremony and reception. Everything is conditioned and kept cool in the shop, the personal flowers are made last, and delivery and setup are coordinated with the venue.

If you want a hybrid plan, say so at the start. I am glad to design the pieces that matter most and deliver conditioned flowers for your family to arrange, and to tell you honestly which parts are worth doing yourself. Either way, the goal is the same: on the day, you should be thinking about the people, not the flowers.

Questions people ask me