DIY Faux Elopement Bouquet | It’s Easier than you Think!
Florals are one of my favorite parts of wedding day details and silk flowers make for a beautiful faux elopement bouquet. But as you start planning your hiking elopement and dig into the regulation of the parks, you may start finding that certain plants and flowers are prohibited. Why? Washington protects it’s natural areas as much as possible, and if you bring a non-native species into an area, it might wreck some of the other wonderful things that happen in that area!
How do you skirt that and get the bouquet of your dreams? Have your florist create a faux elopement bouquet, or try your own hand at a DIY bouquet!
Benefits of a faux elopement bouquet for hikes:
● Seasons don’t matter in terms of flower availability
● Don’t need to keep it in water!
● You can make the bouquet months before in your planning process and it won’t die
● Potentially lighter than some flowers because they aren’t holding water (bonus for hiking!)
● You can keep it after your wedding
● They can look extremely real!
If you still want real flowers- that’s totally cool! Just check with your park ranger to make sure you understand what you can and cannot have and work with your florist to make that happen!
But if you want some creative fun, make your own bouquet!
For my wedding, I used the website (which literally is a personal favorite) www.afloral.com to buy faux flowers! I felt like this was a major step up from Hobby Lobby and their quality is amazing. They even have real touch flowers which feel even better than traditional artificial flowers! They do change up their stock to keep things fresh. If they don’t have what’s exactly listed below for my bouquet, they may have something similar!
What you will need:
● Variety of flowers (6-8 medium size flower heads, 3-5 mini flower heads)
● Fillers Stems
● Wire Cutter
● Floral Tape
● Ribbon
For this faux elopement bouquet, I’m using:
● 3 Pink Artificial Dahlia Flowers
For my filler stems, I’m using:
Step 1: Brainstorm!
What color or vibe do you want for your bouquet?
For this bouquet, I went for a blush tone, and used a lot of this color!
Pro Tip: I’m personally not about what’s in season, what’s popular or what the trendy colors are for the year. If you’ve dreamed of having some tropical plants but are in the middle of the mountains, or a purple bouquet in the fall, DO IT. Flowers are an extra expression of who you are! You pick exactly what flowers YOU want.
Step 2: Create a mood board.
You can do this anywhere – on Pinterest, in Google Docs, or even print it out!
Take screenshots of any flowers you like in various colors and styles for your vibe and put them all together on a board.
Eliminate flowers you aren’t crazy about after seeing it all together.
Pro Tip – make sure you take a look at the dimensions of the flower heads. This way you’ll add a variety of sizes to your elopement bouquet!
Step 3: Purchase your flowers!
Step 4: Build your Bouquet
This definitely can be a trial and error process. Start with a couple flowers in your hand, and build the bouquet one flower at a time, thinking about the size of the flower head, and play with heights of flowers/filler.
Play with the flower placement in multiple variations to get the look you want.
Once you have your flowers in the place you want them, start adding the greenery and fillers, even moving a few stems in between the flowers of your bouquet.
Step 5: Secure your faux bouquet!
For extra shape control, take about 4 inches of flower wire and wrap around the area you’ll hold, and make sure it’s tight!! This helped me keep the flowers in place before adding the floral tape.
Grab your floral tape and start wrapping around the stems, wrapping up and down taking up about an inch of space. (The tape engages its sticking quality when it is stretched.) Hold the starting point down and wrap the flowers, to make sure the tape is tight and secure.
Step 6: Trim excess stems lengths with your wire cutter, if desired!
Step 7: Add your ribbon!
Wrap your ribbon in a criss-cross manner until you cover the tape or are happy with the length.
Step 8: Admire your design!
Your bouquet will look amazing- share any pictures with me, I’d love to see them!
I love this! You did such a beautiful job with the bouquet and the steps are so easy to follow. I am making my own faux bouquet for my elopement and this is such a great resource. ☺️ It’s also a great reminder to look into the different regulations around brining plants into different areas to make sure that you are following LNT!
This is such a great idea! Leave no trace principles are essential, and it’s great that you communicate that and what couples can do instead. You are spot on – anyone can have a bouquet consist of the colors they want no matter what time of year they get married. The links that you’ve provided are so convenient as well, and the bouquet you’ve made here is gorgeous! Thank you for putting this together!
Wow – what a clever and sustainable idea! Not only is this an awesome tutorial for DIY elopement bouquets, but also for your home or seasonal decorations! These silk florals photographed so perfectly and are probably much easier to pack for a location!
WOW! Omg , if you did not tell me these are faux flowers, i would have never guessed! They all look amazing! YOu’re so awesome in making bouquets wow!
Wow! it is so amazing. I love the way how you make bouquets <3
Where was this when I was getting eloped!!! I hated hobby lobby options!
It’s amazing how real a faux floral bouquet can look and with new rules at so many locations having this option is so helpful!