Candi's Floral Creations

Me and David Tutera

I did it!   I met the fabulous David Tutera!!! For all of you who don’t know him, he’s the best wedding designer/planner out there!  He tells the brides like it is, in such a delicate, “real”, compassionate way.  Sometimes brides need to hear the hard truth about style and taste for them to really move on to design the wedding of their dreams with STYLE!!

Let’s face it, not everyone has great taste or may have great taste but are but are not sure how to bring all the details together to create your story.  That’s why you hire great professionals that have the skills and know-how to take your thoughts and ideas and create a wedding that is really all about  your style and  personality.  David does this and does it with such passion and compassion.

His newest book is out in stands now and it’s called “The Big White Book of Weddings”  It’s very detailed and helpful when planning your wedding.

He also has a TV show on We Tv called My fair Wedding.  It’s all about what he’s about, taking the ideas that brides have and executing them in a more style and savvy way!  FABULOUS!!!

Candi’s Floral Creations and Ambiance {Chic} Wedding Designs are very excited to have a wedding be featured in Martha Stewart Weddings Magazine in this December issue. The issue is to be Martha’s 15th anniversary and get this…the very first same sex wedding featured!!

Andrew and Jeremy found me through an amazing wedding planner, Erica for Ambiance {Chic} Wedding Designs. They were rather fun and eccentric with what they envisioned for their decor.

One would call it Vintage – Americana. A.K.A: gathering anything old that was American at flea markets and tag sales and turn it into a theme for your guest tables. Well, wouldn’t ya know, it worked and turned out better than anyone ever expected!

They were so thrilled with what Erica and I had done with their ideas, that they went ahead and submitted their wedding to MSW and the rest is history….

I hope you can pick up a copy and enjoy the article!

The fabulous photos were taken by Jacklyn from JAGstudios, she did an awesome job of capturing every detail and make it come to life!

Click here to view Andrew & Jeremy’s Floral Creation Gallery on the website. If you would like to download a PDF of the article, just click the thumbnail below.

Click the thumbnail to download the article from Martha Stewart!

Well, the enchanted forest wedding theme is getting pretty popular, and I have to say, I love it!  I must have been a fairy (probably a floral fairy) in a past life because I am so drawn to this theme and keep thinking of new things to add to it all the time!  Since I have many brides contacting me with this theme, I wanted to come up with a really unique enchanted forest tree that does not look like the ever so played out manzanita trees (although, I still love using them).  My tree is the best, if I do say so myself!  For cost-cutting purposes, I rent these trees out.  They are still a bit pricey, but they are well worth it!  I add things to it all the time. The tree looks great with moss balls, candles, flower heads added to the table around the base of the tree. Along with nestling moss and fresh flowers into the trunk, I hang fantasy flowers and colorful votives from the branches.  You can add butterflies and dragonflies – fantasy or real-looking.  It’s a forest, anything goes!!

Since most brides can not afford to put trees on every table, I have designed 2 shorter enchanted forest themed centerpieces for the other tables.  I think it looks better to have a handful of these impressive  trees scattered throughout the room mixing them with lower styles in the same theme.  Gives you the feel you are in a forest, enchanted, of course!

Enchanted Forest Tree Centerpiece

Enchanted Forest Floral Centerpiece

Enchanted Forest Floating Flower Table Centerpiece / Cocktail Hour Decor

As you can see there are many designs I can come up with to make your enchanted forest theme wedding be very unique!   The last picture can be a very simple guest table centerpiece or we ca use a smaller bowl and have them on your bistro tables for cocktail hour to really carry your theme throughout your entire event.

Okay, so this centerpiece you’re about to see is HUGE, so get ready!  I was invited by Winvian (an extraordinary resort tucked away in the Litchfield Hills) to partake in a exclusive bridal show of preferred vendors.

Winvian is home to many unnamed famous clients whom enjoy the horses and vineyard while they stay in the eclectically designed high end cabins.

Since I knew that it would take place in the barn they rent out for weddings, I wanted to go with warm colors and a harvest feel.  I love mixing unique items with flowers such as champagne grapes, wired covered moss balls, artichokes, candles, moss covered candles etc  Especially in the fall, bringing natural elements into the design really completes the harvest feel.

This style of design is a perfect impression piece for a wedding place card table, a hotel foyer, a restaurant entry way etc.

Click on the pictures to see more of the details!

Base of centerpiece

napkin flower

This wedding chuppah is a rental item.  It is best used for outdoor where it can be decorated with flowering branches for that natural feel. Don’t let the picture fool you, it was taken with a fish eye lens by Danny Kash! You can see more photos from this wedding on our website in Tedessa and Jeff’s Gallery.

Owenego Tennis and Racket Club, Branford, Ct

This ceremony chuppah is a rental item that can be used indoor or outdoor.  It can be covered with any color fabric and decorated how you like.

St Clement's Castle, Portland, Ct

Just another look we can get by changing the fabric and decor

My sister-in-law was getting married and since they were going to a tropical island for their honeymoon, she wanted her wedding to have that same feel.  Since she and her now husband are young, fun and love a party atmosphere, we thought the luau theme would be perfect.  Unfortunately it was a rainy day, but once you stepped into the room, you were transported onto the tropical island where rain was the last thing on anyone’s mind.

This tropical theme can be used for birthday parties, bridal showers, rehearsal dinners, jack and jill showers and much more!

You can click on picture to get a better view.

Entrance into the dining room

Palm Tree Centerpieces

Every Guest got a lei and a hand-made maraca. The Bridal Party wore fresh orchid leis!

a REAL Coconut to hold the table number!

My sister-in-law was getting married and she donned me “Wedding Planner, Floral Designer and (lucky me) Matron of Honor”  WOW!  What a task!  I had a blast.

For her bridal shower I wanted to do something totally different.  She’s young, stylish, popular….so the Sunday afternoon, long, drawn out shower wasn’t gonna cut it!

I planned a COCKTAIL PARTY!  It was SO much fun that I would definitely recommend everyone plan a shower this way.  Her young friends had fun and even the older gals loved getting out of the house on a Saturday night.  It’s even a little cheaper because you serve hors d oeuvres and make your own cocktails!

I had all of the bridesmaids make a cocktail that were different colors, alcohols and flavors, then we chose hors d oeuvres that coordinated with each drink.  We displayed the pairs on their own table with about a dozen drinks already poured into the fun shaped glasses for a great visual affect.

I chose long banquet tables, for a relaxing, casual setting.  The centerpieces were simple table scapes and every table was a bit different.  I took advantage of the fact that the party was at night and used a ton of candles, but mixed it up with bright pink Gerbera Daisies and limes!  I thought of every different combo you could design and ran with it: floating Gerbers, arranged Gerbers, floating lime slices, submerged whole limes, and then mixed the 2 together.  I used all different types of vases for the flowers and the candles and adorned the candle holders with funky ribbon.

I can go on and on about the details…..but the pictures say it best!  My sister, the photographer, took all the pics for me!

Remember that you can click on the picture for a larger view.  Cheers!

Personalized Drink mixes for Favors

Drink and food Stations

YUMMY!

Deeee LISH!!

The invitation!

Every year we decorate a few area businesses for the holidays.  I’ve chosen to feature Cafe Allegre; an upscale Italian restaurant and Inn located in Madison, CT.  The owners, Vicky and Silvio, also own and run The Woodwinds, located in Branford CT.

Decorating 8 Christmas trees, 2 mantels, a 20′ bar area, 3 rooms, and the front entrance, etc it can get a bit pricey.  My cost cutting solution this year was to use glittered gold garland, and a lot of it!  Since it takes up so much space, I didn’t need as many ornaments on the trees, garlands or wreaths.  Plus, I found these great plastic ornaments that were decorated with a gold glitter design….they looked fabulous and no one could tell they were plastic!  They were perfect to use on all the outdoor wreaths, trees and garlands.

Another trick is to use a lot of ribbon.  Although really nice ribbon can be expensive,  it takes up a lot of space.

When I decorate my trees, garlands, or wreaths, I always start with a theme.  Cafe Allegre’s theme is gold and burgundy.  Once I knew my colors, then I start on thinking of about 4 main things to decorate with.  I find that if you use too many things, it becomes very busy, which is not good for a restaurant.  You want to keep it simple, but full.

I chose: A gold Glitter Garland, Burgundy and Gold Ribbon, Burgundy Poinsettias, and Gold and Burgundy mixed ornaments.  Some of the main trees and garlands had a bit more, but not too much more.  You want your trees to have personality and to look intriguing.  You don’t want to just fill them up with all ornaments…that’s not creative!  Once you choose your 4 main focal pieces, then you can have fun and be creative with mixing up the colors, hanging ornaments from ribbon, adding ornaments to the center of poinsettias…etc

I hope you can get some ideas for you home, enjoy!

Remember, you can click on the pictures to get a better view.

Decor for the "Garden Room"

More for Garden Room

Moss Ball Topiary for the Garden Room

I’m not the kind of person to throw a party for myself, but, I did! ….and boy was it a great time!

My friend Erica, the owner of Ambiance {chic} Wedding Designs(it was really her idea!), and I thought it would be fun to celebrate the fact that one of our weddings we designed together was featured in Martha Stewart Wedding Magazine.  We had also just revamped our websites and wanted to show them off!

In the wedding industry you work with so many vendors every weekend, but it’s always just business.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve worked with the same photographer, but we’ve never spoken to each other about anything other than the wedding we had been working on together.  So we thought it would be a great idea to invite all the people we love to work with within the wedding industry as well as family and friends.

We had a wonderful turnout!  Even though the loft was filled with photographers, coordinators, videographers, florists, bakers, etc  There wasn’t much wedding talk.  It was such a great night to just get to know these people I’ve known for years…if you get my drift. Networking usually is so boring, but we made it fun!

Erica took care of the designing the email invite, linens, lighting, the music, etc While, I had a blast designing the centerpieces.  Remember the winter party was called “Fire and Ice”.  So the “fire”part of our vision was to use a lot of candles, but we wanted to be creative about it.  Some candles were floating in water with ice chips at the bottom of the candle holder, while I rolled other glass candle holders in actual sugar so they would have a frosted look. We even embellished plain glass hanging candle holders by adorning them with chandelier crystals and hung them from silver wire.

I love the look of various size and shaped glass vases and candle holders….but then love to mix up floating candles, floating flowers, and single flowers in the vases.  I like doing this because it keeps people looking all night!

For the “Ice” feel, we used accents of fake snow( which I learned is very versatile!), chandelier crystals, crystal garlands, iced birch branches, and my favorite accent…a rhinestone in the center of a rose.  We only used white hydrangea and roses so that all the other accents could really shine through!

We use two different height centerpieces, again, it keeps the eye moving around the room and I couldn’t decide on which centerpiece to design…so I used them both!  That was the fun part about designing for my own party…I could REALLY do whatever I wanted!

I won’t bore you with anymore details……let the pictures finish the story….Enjoy!

Every job has it’s “downs” and one of them, for me, happens to be funerals.  It’s a big part of floral design, not the happiest part, but a big part.

I have had the pleasure of working with such a compassionate man named Sal.  He had contacted me a month prior to his mother’s passing, she had been in hospice. He had been planning this for some time.  He was going to have a video montage of her, photos of her, an Italian priest to prepare the funeral in her native language, and also a broadway pianist to play her favorite songs,  What a farewell!

He contacted me because he wanted the best…his words!  He wanted to design something that was very unique and extravagant for his very traditional mother.  Not traditional in the sense of style, but traditional when it came to morals, family values, and modesty.  He spoke so highly of her, it was very heartwarming.

So, he wanted to give her the best he could ever give her, because she gave him her best.

We designed an all white casket spray of mostly calla lilies.  There were many tropical accents such as cataleya orchids, aralea leaves, denrobium orchids, brunia berries, ti and aspadistra leaves, etc    I braided lily grass together to cover the wire that I used to bind the flowers together.  I love this technique.  It can be used in many different ways such as wrapping around the stems of bridal bouquets!

Sal wanted the casket piece to literally be made up of all little bouquets.  I had to group flowers together and bind them so no one could see that there were bouquets.  He wanted to be able to just pull flowers out of the spray as bouquets that he could give away to close friends and family members.

This not only took design skill, it took patience!  I had a total of 15 mini bouquets bound within the casket piece.  It was a challenge, one that Iolanda (Sal’s mother) helped me achieve.

He also needed accent pieces to coordinate with the casket spray.  We flanked them around the casket and scattered them throughout the room.

When I got to the funeral home, there were a ton of the very ugly (dare I say) and traditional funeral arrangements.  So Sal and I spent about an hour rearranging the entire room by moving these other pieces away from the casket.  We moved them to other rooms, the corners of the room, the hallway!  I even redesigned some of the arrangements themselves to make them look more elegant.  You know, taking the babies breath out, clipping the browning petals…..even taking flowers out of one and putting them into another to create a more cohesive color combination.

I have to say, Iolanda would have been so proud and was probably smiling down at Sal for being the son that she raised!

You can click on the pics below to get a better view.

Calla Lily Casket Spray

Accent Piece with Calla Lilies

Braided Lily Grass Wrap

Tropical Aralea leaf

I took the burgundy "throat" off of this green cymbidium orchid because I did not want the burgundy color to stand out. It makes the orchid look even more tropical.

I hardly take part in bridal shows anymore, but when I do they are so much fun.  This bridal show was held at The Woodwinds (where I am a preferred florist) in Branford, Ct and hosted by The Perfect Wedding Guide.  I must say that PWG has their stuff together and puts on a good show!

Below are some shots of my table and my creations, enjoy!

Our very full table!

Manzanita Tree with hanging Orchids

For all you "GREEN" brides out there!

Enclosed Cymbidium Orchid

Bright Centerpiece in Moss Covered Vase and Votives

Callas enclosed in tall embellished vase Purple bouquet to match Fall centerpiece arranged in a pumpkin

Winter white wedding centerpiece....vase is filled with snow!