It was a colorful wedding in red, purple, and pink at Yamashiro Restaurant in Hollywood. Corinna carried a hand-tied bouquet of purple hydrangea, pink cymbidium orchids, purple mini calla lilies, and deep red roses.

Each bridesmaid carried a similar, but simplified, bouquet of purple hydrangea and deep red roses.

Hide wore a pink cymbidium orchid boutonniere accented with horsetail, while the groomsmen and family members wore purple mini calla lily boutonnieres, also accented with horsetail.

The mothers wore wristlet corsages made of pink cymbidium orchids and purple mini calla lilies.

For the centerpieces, Corinna and Hide requested bright and vivid colored flowers arranged in a unique and modern design. Each table sat six guests and we placed a rectangular centerpiece in the center. We topped the surface of each black wooden box with purple or plum carnations and arranged a row of short pieces of horsetail down the mid-line of the box. Then we arranged, in parallel, red and fuchsia ranunculus, plum anemones, and magenta dendrobium orchids around the horsetail. As a finishing touch, we weaved several lengths of purple midollino around and throughout the flowers and horsetail. These unique and colorful centerpieces were a big hit!

Valerie and David were recently married at the lovely Altadena Town and Country Club on a beautiful, sunny Sunday in February. It was a garden and vintage-inspired wedding in ivory, purple, and plum. We were at the height of ranunculus and anemone season – especially local varieties grown in Carpenteria.

The bride carried a hand-tied bouquet in a natural and wild style with peonies, anemones, lisianthus, limonium, waxflower, sword fern, and seeded eucalyptus.

In contrast, the bridesmaids carried bouquets of mostly white and ivory flowers with accents of variegated Italian pittosporum leaves. The flowers included lisianthus, ranunculus, anemones, and snapdragons. I loved the rustic and sweet vintage feel of these bouquets.

Boutonnieres and corsages were made with ivory ranunculus accented with a succulent, plus light purple freesia for the women.

For the ceremony, we decorated the arch lightly concentrating at the top of the structure. In addition to the flowers, which consisted of limonium, anemones, lisianthus, ranunculus as well as seeded eucalyptus and ivy vines, we hung little glass mason jars with purple ribbon filled with the same purple and plum colored flowers.

Mason jars filled with spring flowers were hung from every other aisle chair, and the aisle was lined with ivory rose petals.

For the reception centerpieces, the flowers were held in silver metal buckets and surrounded by small mason jars filled with similar spring, garden flowers. As in the ceremony flowers, we used ranunculus, anemones, limonium, snapdragons, waxflower, lisianthus, and accents of sword fern and seeded eucalyptus.

Last month hubby and I went to the lovely garden isle of Kauai to attend our friends’ Dallas and Rachelle’s wedding. On our second day there, I saw an article in the local paper about a lei making workshop at the Kauai Museum. It was not your typical needle lei-making class, but rather a 6 hour long affair to learn the wrapping or “wili” method of making a head lei or lei po’o. You know it’s going to be intense when they tell you to bring your own sack lunch!

Master lei maker Kumu Kalei Cadawas began the class with an introduction to some neat Hawaiian chants. Something to sing when you are on the mountain ready to begin collecting the materials for your lei. It is in essence a way to greet Nature and ask for permission to enter the forest and begin collecting leaves and flowers. Kumu (which means “teacher”) Kalei also included an inspirational chant for when you find yourself feeling tired and sluggish from working on the same lei for over 5 hours!

There were about 10 women in the workshop and we sat in the shade of the courtyard of the historical Kauai museum. The sun was shining and there was a slight cool breeze – how wonderful to learn and work with plants and flowers outdoors!

Each student received a lovely parcel of goodies wrapped specially in several ti leaves.

After untying the piece of raffia at the top, the ti leaves separated and fell down, opening like a blossoming flower to reveal all the ferns and flowers we would be using for our lei po’o. What a delicious surprise! I had never seen this way of packaging before and loved it! We re-used the ti leaf package to hold our leis at the end of class.

Here is a picture of the finished product!

Notice how the inside of the lei is completely covered with ferns making it comfortable to wear – no errant stems sticking you in the head.

After class, I asked Kumu Kalei if it would be appropriate to wear the lei I just made to Dallas and Rachelle’s wedding. He replied that it was very much appropriate indeed. In fact, giving the gift of lei is very special and is a gift of the heart. I considered giving the lei to the bride and groom, but I only had one to give and suspected they probably had their own leis specially prepared for the wedding. So I wore the head lei to the wedding (to poor hubby’s embarrassment!) which was a lot of fun. After the ceremony, I gave it to Dallas and he wore it for their after wedding pictures and almost the entire rest of the evening. He got a little too sweaty with it on after he started to boogie.

Look how awesome the groom looks with it on!

Denise and David were married at the beautiful hotel, Shutters on the Beach, in Santa Monica. A romantic winter wedding, their colors were deep red, white, and light green.

Denise carried a bridal bouquet of deep red and white flowers: white peonies, white “polo” roses, red “avanta” garden roses, white cymbidium orchids, and dark burgundy schwarzwalder mini calla lilies.

Her bridesmaids carried bouquets of light green cymbidium orchids and deep red “Black Magic” roses.

I love these floral ring bearer pillows! This one was made of green kermit poms and accented with freesia and a cymbidium orchid.

The ceremony was held on the pool deck at sunset with the Pacific Ocean in view.

Tall white arrangements of hydrangea and “casablanca” lilies were placed on pedestals framing the bride and groom.

A light green cymbidium orchid was placed at each place setting on the reception tables. We also made three tall separate, yet similar, designs for the centerpieces. For each centerpiece we used white orchids, hydrangea, and light green hypericum berries. We also accented the centerpieces with hanging crystals.

Here’s design #1, a sphere of hydrangea, roses, and hypericum berry placed on a cylinder with immersed white dendrobium orchids. Long stems of white dendrobium orchids radiate out and downward with 10″ crystal strands attached to the stems.

Here’s design #2 featuring curly willow branches, cymbidium orchids, and dendrobium orchids; a classic arrangement with stems in the water.

I really liked how this design turned out (#3). We placed a sphere of hydrangea and hypericum berry on top of a cylinder filled with immersed white dendrobium orchid stems. Curly willow branches radiated up and out from the top center of the floral sphere and were accented with long white Hawaiian dendrobium orchids. We finished the arrangement by hanging clear teardrop shaped crystals from the branches.

Tina and Mauricio were married at The Castaway Restaurant in Burbank. Set atop a hill, the restaurant has 360 degree views of Los Angeles. Lots of twinkling lights in the evening when the reception is in full swing. However, we had a rainier than usual October and on the day of Tina and Mauricio’s wedding, it was pouring rain. So they moved the ceremony from the outdoor patio to the ballroom.

When I talked to Tina about her wedding flowers, she mentioned a lot of things she loved – in particular, green cymbidium orchids and red berries. The table linens were in a dark chocolate brown and her matron of honor was wearing a fuchsia satin dress.

For the wedding arch, we hung floral spheres made of green kermit poms and white daisies tied with fuchsia satin ribbon. In between and around the floral spheres, we tied hanging glass icicle-shaped bud vases filled with stems of pink ranunculus, anemones, and hypericum berry.

The bride carried a bouquet of green cymbidium orchids, white cymbidium orchids, white freesia, and lots of red hypericum berries. Her matron of honor carried a bouquet of all pink cymbidium orchids accented with lots of hypericum berry.

Mauricio wore a boutonniere made of a white cymbidium orchid and accented with hypericum berry. His best man and the fathers wore boutonnieres of all red hypericum berry with a touch of jade green trachelium.

The moms wore wristlets of green cymbidium orchids, white freesia, and red hypericum berry.

For the reception table centerpieces, we made two-tiered arrangements filled with mostly pink flowers and maidenhair fern for a lush, garden look. We used all in-season flowers – ranunculus, dahlias, sweetpeas, anemones, alstroemeria, green baby hydrangea, magenta mokara orchids, green dendrobiums, hot pink spray roses, red hypericum berry, and amazing tree peonies.

Tree peonies usually start showing up in the market for the month of October and come in beautiful shades of pink, purple, yellow, and peach. The stems come short so they work best in centerpieces as opposed to hand-tied bouquets. They have enormous blooms with large fluffy petals – so beautiful!!

Around the centerpieces were personalized Kleenex boxes at each place setting as favors for the guests. I had never seen this before and thought it was a great idea – very practical and cute too!