Common Questions When Choosing Flowers for a Wedding
Each winter, our inbox fills with inquiries as “engagement season” peaks – did you know that nearly half of all proposals take place from Thanksgiving through Valentine’s Day? As newly engaged couples begin dreaming of the flowers for their wedding, the questions swirl! Many people on our floral team field questions about wedding flowers, but perhaps none more than Devon, our Weddings & Special Projects manager, and Cassie, our Floral Design Project Manager. They are the resident experts connecting couples with their dream wedding flowers, helping to customize quotes and coordinate details to make the big day filled with perfect petals. Fun fact: these two are also sisters-in-law!
Sure, we have an FAQ page that covers all our most common customer questions, but what about questions specific to selecting flowers for weddings? To help make it easier for our couples, we’ve compiled a list of wedding flower FAQs, and Devon and Cassie’s expert answers. Wedding planning is hard enough – we want your floral experience to be fun and easy, so you can save your energy for the tougher decisions (like who’s sitting next to cousin Bob at the reception… yikes!)
Getting Started - Choosing Flowers for a Wedding
“I don’t know where to begin… Can I get a quote for wedding flowers?”
Phew, we know there are lots of details to consider when selecting flowers for a wedding. So much depends on the scope: who might need “personal florals” (a wedding bouquet or boutonnieres for the wedding party for example), as well as the size, scale, and location of the ceremony or reception.
Whether you’re planning a courthouse elopement or a destination wedding for 300 guests, once you have a general idea of the scope of your wedding, we suggest checking out our À La Carte Wedding Menu as a starting point to gather inspiration and information. You can see the range of options we offer, add your favorites to your cart, play around and see how different combinations might fit together to build your dream wedding florals. We share transparent pricing for our wedding florals, to make it easy for you to use our site as a wedding flower calculator!
Once you’ve had time to browse, you’re empowered to reach out to us with a floral budget and list of items you love from our menu. Even if you’re not sure exactly what flowers you want to order, it’s helpful for us to know the ballpark budget so we can advise on the best floral options to fit your event. The more info you can share when you reach out to inquire about your wedding florals, the easier it is to pair you with the perfect blooms.
“What is the difference between Native Poppy’s ALC weddings vs. Full Service?”
We serve a wide range of weddings, from tiny elopements with a single witness, to epic multi-day events with a guest list to rival the Oscars. We’ve built our wedding offerings with gorgeous designs at the core, but there are a few things that differentiate our À La Carte Weddings from our Full Service Weddings.
Our À La Carte Wedding Menu allows you to pick and choose from our pre-set, curated collection of wedding florals – everything is designed in Native Poppy’s signature style with beautiful seasonal blooms, and you can customize by selecting your preferred color combinations. After your wedding is over, you’ll keep the vases, or you may return them to our shops to trade in for free flowers. All our À La Carte wedding flowers are available for delivery within San Diego, or you can schedule free in-store pickup. This menu is built for ease and simplicity: every À La Carte item can be ordered from our website with no order minimum, and no consultation required.
Choosing Full Service offers additional levels of customization, including large-scale installations that our florists tailor to the venue, and we’ll provide fully custom proposals and design mockups to help bring your vision to life. This tier offers added customization of your vases to match your decor, and opens access to our full collection of rental vessels, candles, and more. For our Full Service clients, we are able to offer long distance delivery or travel outside of San Diego, including international destinations. Our Full Service wedding offerings begin at a $10K order minimum.
“We selected our wedding colors – can we see examples of past designs in different sizes and color palettes?”
Heck yeah! We have gathered lots of wedding floral inspo for you over on Pinterest, where we have boards with examples by color palette (like Neutral + Elegant designs, or Dark + Moody florals). We also have pinboards organized by the style of design, like a board of Native Poppy wedding bouquets from previous seasons, or a collection of wearable floral designs. It’s a great place to look for inspiration – we’ll ask you for a few inspo photos as part of the booking process, so save your faves!
Our À La Carte wedding menu allows for easy color customization of each design based on your color preferences. While most designs show just one example product photo, we offer flexibility with color palette, and invite you to add your color requests in your order notes.
Refining your Wedding Floral Vision
“How do I know what size bouquet is right for me?”
Our florists are happy to offer consultations, to help home in on the perfect flowers for weddings. In our South Park and Solana Beach flower shops, we have sample wedding bouquets made with silk flowers, which offers the opportunity to hold each size and get a sense of what fits you best. Ultimately the size of a wedding bouquet comes down to budget and what floral ingredients are used, but visiting in-person to see our sample silk bouquets can help clarify sizes.
“What about my bridesmaids? What size bouquet should I get for my wedding party?”
We offer four sizes of wedding bouquets since there’s no single “right” size for a wedding party – it depends on your style and budget. We’ve had many clients ask for smaller options for their bridesmaids, inspired by gorgeous wedding florals in a restricted palette. In that case, our Flower Child Bouquet is a lovely option, even for adults – it's SO cute, extra petite, and can match blooms from your larger bouquet. You could even consider adding an extra as your tossing bouquet, if you plan to have your bridal bouquet professionally preserved (or just don’t wanna give it away!)
“What centerpieces should I use for my wedding reception? What style arrangement works best for different size tables?”
We suggest round centerpieces for round tables, and we have lots of sizes available to fit your budget. For rectangular or farmhouse tables, our Long & Low flower arrangements are great for mirroring the shape of a long communal table, or bud vases in varied sizes can be scattered between taper candles for an elegant reception table.
“Can I reuse ceremony florals for the reception?”
Yes! We highly encourage repurposing so you get to enjoy your blooms all day long. Kinda like an outfit that can transition from workday to night out, repurposing wedding flowers is super satisfying. Aisle markers and pedestals can be easily moved, perhaps to a welcome table or near a seating chart. Our meadow aisle markers can be reused after the ceremony to decorate a sweetheart table or the DJ booth. We’ve seen a trend towards shorter ceremonies, so this is a way to extend the floral joy, and stretch your budget a bit further.
“Do you offer alternatives to a floral arch for a wedding ceremony?”
Totally! One popular option is to place two or more pedestals in varied heights, topped with larger centerpieces on top, and aisle markers below, creating a dimensional tiered look. These can be reused later at the reception, too!
We’ve also developed a lower-height option for ceremony florals that we call a “ground arch.” This design is a crescent or semi-circle of meadow markers positioned together to create a curved shape that frames the couple during the ceremony. This is a lovely option for when you have a stunning vista of mountains or the ocean behind the altar, as it allows for unobstructed views for your guests.
“Can Native Poppy build a flower arch using a frame that’s already at our venue?”
We can often accommodate arch frames from outside vendors. Please provide us with pictures, dimensions and your vision for the design – if you can share how you’d like flowers to cover the frame, that helps us create your custom quote.
Wedding Flower Logistics
“Do you provide setup or breakdown for weddings?”
Yes, we offer setup and strike (breakdown) by request for an added fee. If you need assistance setting up the flowers at your wedding, we offer service at $75/hour per florist on site. We can offer a quote based on the timing of setup and the scope of your event. Strike/breakdown is calculated as a percentage of your order total and scope of breakdown needed!
“Do you deliver outside of San Diego?”
We can deliver wedding flowers for an added fee to areas outside of San Diego county including; Julian, Temecula and South Orange County – pending staff availability on the date of your event.
