Yesterday while consulting with a bride I was pointed to a website called Design Seeds. This site is all about color and how colors work together. I would highly suggest that brides use this site when choosing wedding color palettes. The Design Seeds blog is loaded with inspiration and it allows the reader to easily download color swatches so that they can be emailed to me, your floral designer!! This site is so incredibly awesome, I may get lost here for a few days!! I love this!!

Bouquet photography by Vicki Grafton.

Color inspiration swatch by Design Seeds.

Bouquet by Holly Heider Chapple Flowers.

Lacy and Kevin married this fall at the Thomas Birkby House in Leesburg Virginia.. This was another wonderful Loudoun wedding.  The couple chose purple and blue wedding flowers with a Jan Austin/secret garden influence.

Lacy’s bridal bouquet was created with anmesia roses, blue nigella, blue thistle, lavender opal classic hydrangea, dusty miller, purple scabiosa, purple callas, calcynia heather, astrantia, and dark plum toned dahlias.

Maids carried natural stems of blue thistle, dusty miller, and opal classic hydrangea.

This wedding was so beautiful and it was a joy to design. We loved our bride and her wonderful mother. The family booked Holly Heider Chapple Flowers a year before the wedding.  The family truly loved and appreciated our ideas and designs and it was a constant pleasure to work with them. They did an amazing job gathering fun containers for the centerpieces and even choosing the linens. They had a vision in mind and they clearly brought it to life, with just a little help from us.

I am also sharing with you a lovely note from the brides mother…

Oh, Holly!
Words fail me in trying to describe my/our delight with the magnificent flowers for Lacey’s wedding.  Your interpretation of our Jane Austin/Secret Garden vision was nothing less than spectacular.  To a person, each of our guests complimented “us” on the décor and floral designs.  I can not begin to thank you for the flower magic you created for Lacey & Kevin’s special day.  You and your team are truly amazing. I will never be able to thank you enough for creating the day for us.

With love and great admiration,
Karen
Happy married life Lacy and Kevin and thank you for allowing us to be a part of your Jane Austin weddng!!

Many thanks to my good friend and photographer Genevieve Leiper for doing such a wonderful job capturing this day!!!

 

Tonight we had the pleasure of working on a very spectacular event designed by the Gala Design Group.  The party was a black and white Hollywood themed party and the decor was absolutely perfect. The room was completely draped in black and the room featured amazing chandeliers, a wall of classic movie memorabilia, a movie screen draped in gold curtains, my flowers and even a life-sized Oscar Award.  Linens and chair covers were custom ordered for this event by Gala Design.  Guests will walk the Hollywood walk of fame as they enter into the party. Yes, this one was outrageous!!!

Sexy right!!!

Our yesterday was about a holiday decor installation at a private residence. On this job we met a buffalo.

The foyer design and the kitchen design were incredibly clever. I loved the evergreen, pine cones, and magnolia on the outside of the vase. These pictures are very deceiving, this is a 24 inch tall vase so this is a really big design. This piece graced the foyer…

and this design decorated the kitchen.

We also decorated this fabulous entryway mirror.

We will be retuning to this home next week with centerpieces and buffet pieces. This house is about to host an amazing holiday party!!

Please note that all flowers have been delivered and there is nothing “in my cooler.”  Good night!!!

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this wedding, so much so that I am going to give you tons of images for your daily dose of Holly.  This wedding is the perfect summer affair. I love the yellow and white wedding flowers and the gorgeous Woodend Sanctuary. The details that were designed and created by the family, and Kate Harlan of Simply Chic are amazing. Many thanks to photographer Kim Seidl for sharing these lovely photographs. These pictures had me giddy with delight!!! Whoops, one last exciting shout out, this wedding was featured yesterday on Style Me Pretty and you know I LOVE that!!

Stacy’s bridal bouquet was created with white patience garden roses, white dahlias, white zinnias from my garden, white ranunculus, green dianthus, sea star fern, white gooseneck loosestrife, and brown scabiosa pods. The bouquet and all of the flowers had a earthy warm feel that was a nod to the couples love of biking and being outdoors. The grooms bout was created with a scabiosa pod, a ranunculus bud, sea star fern and a piece of the loosestrife.

Every detail was so amazing. I can’t get over how pretty this wedding is. This color combination is amazing and it’s one that is not commonly used. I think we all underestimate how pretty a yellow and white wedding can be.

This picture had me squealing with delight!!

What a wonderful wedding, I am so proud of this amazing yellow and white wedding!!!

One of my favorite events of this year happened to be a rehearsal dinner, and I was so in love with these rehearsal dinner flowers. This remarkable event was also just featured on the inspiring Style Me Pretty blog.  Holly Heider Chapple Flowers is a little black book member of Style Me Pretty, which is a huge honor for our studio!! The rehearsal dinner was planned and styled to be outside, and it was to have a very Southern garden party feel. In spite of our excellant plans, record breaking heat caused our garden party to move inside. Our new dinning space was now a very contemporary art studio.  This caused event planner and Designer Allison Jackson from Pineapple Productions and I to have to seriously rethink our well thought out plans.  The lanterns that were slated to line the walkways were instead suspended from the air to soften the space. I also happened to have buckets of baby’s breath in the studio from a past event. I asked if I could hang these from the ceiling and rafters. I wanted the hanging flowers to appear as if they were hanging in the barn to dry. Allison redesigned the space with several long seating tables and several rounds. She even brought her market umbrellas into the studio. The look was amazing!!!

Free spirit roses, were paired with blue hydrangea, blue thistle, spray roses, herbs, dahlias, and nigella.

Potted rosemary and lavender were also used to enhance the tables.

Vintage boxes, tubs, lanterns, and props were brought in from our studio.

This flowering mint was cut straight from my garden.

This party was so truly beautiful. I left this event very proud of our studio and the last minute ideas we came up with. It’s important that we at Holly Chapple Flowers are always willing and ready to help if there is a change in plans. Being a good team member is a huge part of who we are!!!

Many thanks to Allison from Pineapple, for allowing us to be a part of this remarkable event and a big shout out to photographer Kate Headley who captured this event so stunningly. Kate’s pictures always are a true treat!!

My cousin Greta is the Program Manger for Foster Care and Adoption for the Alexandria Department of Community and Human Services. As I write this I am seriously crying. I am so proud of Greta and all she does to unite these children with loving wonderful parents. Her job is one that truly matters and makes a difference in children’s lives each day. Each year there is an adoption day celebration and cousin Greta drives all the way out to my house to get the families a Holly Chapple flower Bouquet for the party. Helping with this event is such an honor and a complete joy. This year we provided 10 bouquets. My only hope is each year the amount of bouquets I provide will increase. Here is a note from my cousin Greta….

Hi Holly –  The flowers were beautiful and much appreciated!!!!!!

Here are two photos of the Snow family; parents Steve and Mary Kay and their three sons Ari (front), Jeremiah (left), and Rashad (in Steve’s arms).  They received your flowers as part of the City of Alexandria’s Adoption Day Celebration and their adoption of Rashad. This is the family’s third adoption through the City. They are a wonderful family;  Steve and Mary Kay have opened their home to many children in need over the years and have found great joy as foster/adoptive  parents.  They are surrounded by a large and supportive extended family, much like ours.

November is National Adoption Month and you may have have read about other celebrations around the state and country. In addition to celebrating these amazing children and families, we want to draw everyone’s attention to the need for families to open their homes to children in foster care, particularly siblings groups and teens.

Thank you so much for your support. We are thrilled to give our families such beautiful bouquets.

It was great to see you and the flower shop in action. You are doing such unique and beautiful designs. I am so proud of you!!  Love you and see you on Thursday!

-Greta

Here are some additional pictures of this wonderful family.

This is so awesome and it’s a really nice happy thought as we move into the holidays!!

We are busy, busy, busy this Friday designing for this weekends events, but I wanted to share with you the contemporary wedding flowers from our wedding last weekend at the Congressional Country Club in DC.  We had the pleasure of working with event planner Lauryn from Table 6 Productions on this wedding and we are excited about seeing the professional images. Until then I wanted to show you some of our very pretty designs. These pieces show our clean and contemporary side and we do this look perfectly as well.

Non fragrant flowers were chosen for this wedding due to the brides allergies. We at Holly Heider Chapple Flowers had the challenge of making football mums, and carnations sexy and I think we pulled the look off perfectly. Orchids and callas were used to enrich the designs.

Happy Friday we will be back later today with “in the cooler.”

Lauren and Leck married over the summer at Oatlands Plantation. This historic home is one of Loudoun Counties most beautiful estates. The gardens here are an incredible place for portraits, cocktail parties, and wedding ceremonies. Many thanks to event planner Aimee Hardenbergh of True Wedding Events who is an absolute delight to work with, and the super talented Kristi Odom for these incredible photos. I simply love the picture of this couple dancing in the garden.

Maids wore J.Crew gowns. The rich green tone was outrageously beautiful with the blue and green wedding flowers. Maids carried white stock blue and green hydrangea, white phlox, white spray roses, blue delphinium, green seeded euc, and green hypericum.

 

Lauren carried white cabbage roses, mini green hydrangea, white phlox, and green hypericum berry. The bouquet was bound satin ribbon and vintage brooches provided by the family.

Half of the tables had a burlap runner and a full compote bowl of flowers.

The other half of the tables featured a vase that was wrapped in burlap and small mini designs that were either wrapped in burlap or twine. The burlap was an addition the bride loved but due to the elegant and formal environment of Oatlands the MOB wanted it to be used tastefully and simply.

In an effort to use the 9 bridesmaids bouquets I came up with this centerpiece design because it featured one vase in the center of the table. The vase was wrapped in burlap to hide the stems of the maids bouquets and it also reflected back on the tables with the burlap runners.  The maids slipped their bouquets into the vase during the cocktail hour. Because the family wanted the tables to look full and lush we also added 3 smaller designs. The burlap and the mini designs completely covered up the fact that we were using the maids bouquets as a centerpieces.

Maids bouquets were wrapped in burlap and bound with pearl pins.

This wedding was a beauty. Happy married life Lauren and Leck, thank you for choosing Holly Heider Chapple Flowers.

Catalina and Nicholas married this past summer at the George Washington Hotel in Winchester Virginia.  This wedding was photographed by the amazing Genevieve Leiper. Event planning and design was handled by the super fabulous Posh Planner, Lisa Schulz. We at Holly Heider Chapple Flowers provided funky fun contemporary floral designs in green and purple. Elements like babys breath, pears, and apples were used but in a very new and exciting way!!

Catalina’s bouquet featured a huge purple artichoke which you can almost see on the left side of the bouquet, dark purple calla lily, scabiosa pods, purple clematis, green cabbage roses, succulents, green brazilia berry, dark purple carnations, dark purple stock, blue delphinium, and gentiana.

Maids carried bouquets of green cabbage roses, green hydrangea, green hypericum berry, green brazilia, green dianthus, green button mums and scabiosa pods.

The wheat centerpiece was created for the place card table and this was an absolute must for the brides mother. The wheat was a symbol of good luck and I believe fertility!!

Our challenge with this wedding was to use more traditional elements in a unique and contemporary way.  The mound of baby’s breath in this clean elegant glass vase was anchored with a collar of limes this was so bright and refreshing.

Pears and sliced limes were added into the designs. The couple loved the bright green of these elements so they were incorporated into all of the designs and the perfect pair was an underlying theme.

Besides the baby’s breath we had an additional elevated design that featured dripping green amaranthus, purple artichokes, green and white hydrangea, purple carnations, green cabbage roses, green berry and dianthus, and the blue delphinium and gentiana.

Happy married life Catalina and Nicholas, we loved designing your wedding. This was a super fresh and beautiful look!!!

You may have seen me tweet that I was creating a bridal bouquet for my dietitian bride. This bridal bouquet was created for Loudoun bride Carlene. Carlene  also writes a great blog called Carlene’s Figments, and she hopes to open a practice here in Loudoun. I used sage, oregano, mint, mini black peppers, brussel sprouts, green beens, asparagus, okra, sugar snap peas, cabbage, and baby carrots in this bouquet. Oh yes I did use some flowers as well, we used orange santana roses, orange dahlias, purple scabiosa flowers, orange spray roses, silver dusty miller and silver brunia.

It’s yummy right? Carlene married at the Thomas Birkby House in Leesburg Va.

This is our Loudoun bride Betsy. I have known Betsy and her family for years and they are awesome. Betsy married at the Rust Sanctuary also in Leesburg. Betsy works for the Town of Leesburg Parks and Rec with the ROCK Program. She works with at-risk kids in an after school and summer program in four neighborhoods identified by the Leesburg Police Department.  Betsy said her kids are the best kiddos around and that they were so excited about the wedding– that they even celebrated with “wedding” cake from costco! 🙂

Betsey’s bouquet was created with white dahlias from Don, white veronica, balsa wood flowers, sahara roses, nigella pods, golden amaranthus, white spray roses, dusty miller, silver brunia, white ranunculus, green seeded euc, and scabiosa pods.

These were both beautiful Loudoun Weddings and I look forward to seeing more of these images from one of my favorite local photographers Bob Updegrove. Both brides used the Holly Heider Chapple Flowers petals to go program.

HC