Flower Arranging Tips - Connecticut in Style

Connecticut Bloggers – CT in Style is a Connecticut-based lifestyle blog. Elevate your style.

Flowers make me happy, which is why I cannot leave a supermarket without my arms or cart filled. They always make my days brighter, and it’s not just because they are so visually pretty. The overarching reason flowers make my days brighter is because of how they make me feel about my life and my home. A beautifully arranged floral bouquet gives me the sensation that my home is polished. I love walking into our bedroom and seeing a vase on my bedside table, or catching a glimpse of an arrangement as I am going from one room to the next. It elevates the house and in turn, elevates me.

It wasn’t always like this. Previously, when I would get a loose arrangement of flowers I would cut the stems and put them into a vase. They never looked remarkable to me, it was just a bunch of different flowers in many different colors. Over the years, I have been interested in learning how to transform supermarket bought flowers into a sophisticated arrangement and I’ve picked up a few tips along the way that I want to share. These few steps will demonstrate that anyone can make a gorgeous, yet budget-friendly arrangement for your next event – but hopefully, just for your home.

Tips:

Buy twice as many flowers as you think you will need, and inspect the flower stems to make sure that they do not look dark and slimy which is a sign that the flowers have been sitting in water for days and are near fading.
Buy all of one type or two to three types of flowers maximum. More than three different types will present a challenge because I find that they start fighting with each other and do not compliment each other.
Do not be afraid to use only some of the flowers that you bought. You can deconstruct the arrangement and start all over again if you are not happy with how it is turning out and use leftover flowers for another arrangement.
For a professional touch, use Water Resistant Leaf Ribbon (like the variegated tropical leaf ribbon I used) to hide the stems if you are using a clear vase or a vase that you can see the stems through. Alternatively, you can use large real leaves.

While I was at Trader Joe’s I bought several bunches of flowers to make an arrangement (white hydrangea, pink roses, and pink daisies). What I loved about making this tutorial is how pretty the arrangement was with each step of the process. I could have easily stopped with just using all hydrangea, because I love how dramatic something can look when it is so simple. When I added the palest pink roses, the arrangement became soft and romantic. And finally, when I added the pink daisies, the arrangement became bright and happy.