Pressing your floral bouquet
There is no better way to be reminded of how beautiful your wedding day was than having your actual wedding bouquet presented up on the wall in your living space. This method can be easily done by you, as long as you do it soon enough after your wedding day.
To press your wedding bouquet, select flowers from your bouquet that are still healthy in appearance (not wilted) and spread them out on parchment paper so they will be easy to lift up after drying. Make sure to arrange them in the exact way you would like them to be preserved, because once they’re dried, there is no altering their presentation.
Once you’ve arranged your flowers the way you would like, place an additional piece of parchment paper over the top, sandwiching the flowers between. Place the parchment papers between two very heavy objects. like thick textbooks, and leave to dry for seven to ten days.
After this period of time, your wedding florals are ready to frame and display!
Create jewelry
Press your favorite stems from your bouquet, as explained above, and select individual blooms to create custom jewelry. By mixing resin and resin hardener, simply pour the mixture into an open-frame pendant with a bloom in the center, and it will harden into a stunning jewelry pendant that you can use for earrings, necklaces, charms - you name it!
For a more detailed explanation of this process, click here for an easy-to-follow tutorial.
Don’t trust yourself to make custom jewelry pieces yourself and would rather entrust that task to others? Go support small businesses by commissioning talented creatives to create these memorable pieces for you! We found these adorable earrings from the MyosotisGarden shop on Etsy.
Painted florals
While we are fully aware that you began reading this post to find ways to preserve your actual wedding flowers, commissioning a local artist to capture them with a paint medium is a whole other ingenious way to have your wedding memories forever present in your home.
This is a great method to consider if you want your bridal bouquet captured in its original shape. By drying it out or having it pressed, the initial arrangement is sometimes manipulated and its shape is lost or altered. Your flowers also may loose their vibrancy in the days following your wedding, but having them painted can restore their initial coloring.
The pictured bouquet was created for a bride by a local Seattle artist, Paige Lindsey Design.
Hang drying your wedding bouquet
Another simple way to dry your wedding bouquet flowers is by hanging the blooms upside down to dry. This method works best if you disassemble the arrangement and hanging the stems one by one, or in smaller clusters.
Hang the stems upside down in a dry, temperate area in your home, such as in your pantry or closet. Let all the blooms air dry for a week minimum, but make sure to give them longer if you live in a cooler, more humid, environment.
Once your bouquet flowers are all dry, reassemble them however you like and display them around your home.
Displaying your dried florals in a shadow box
After hang-drying your bouquet, you can choose to display the arrangement in a shadow box rather than in a vase. This gives you creative freedom with how you want to arrange the stems and blooms, but in the end, creates gorgeous wall art.
Dried flower ornaments
By either using the pressed floral or hang-drying method to preserve your wedding flowers, you can now break up the flowers into either little stems or flower petals and fill clear ornaments. Made as a set, these are a great idea to solely decorate your Christmas tree with.
Custom ring holder
Another way to preserve your wedding bouquet, while also creating gorgeous everyday items, is with epoxy resin. With clear epoxy resin and molds in various shapes, you can create ring holders, paperweights, decorative shelf art - honestly, whatever you want!
To make a resin decorative items, fil your mold halfway with the epoxy resin and delicately arrange the flowers in the still-wet fluid. When you are satisfied with how they look, fill the remainder of the mold with the epoxy resin and let it dry. Once the mold is removed, you'll have a gorgeous decoration that will keep your wedding bouquet in bloom forever.
Again - not wanting to risk ruining your wedding flowers to try this new craft idea? This is a great opportunity to seek out local artists and creatives who can take your blooms and create beautiful keepsakes for you. The pictured ring holder was created by Leman Floral.
Decorative art piece
One of our favorite floral preservation artists is Jasmyn Marie, who makes simple yet stunning decorative art pieces like this one. Made in a resin medium as well, this is a gorgeous way to display your larger bouquet blooms in all their glory.
Pressed floral resin coasters
If you can’t already tell, we are huge lovers of the practical things in life! Last but not least, we are obsessed with these resin coasters made from pressed blooms. Using the same method as the jewelry pendant idea up above, pour resin into a silicone mold, place your pressed flowers in your preferred arrangement, and fill the rest of the mold with resin. Once it dries, remove your new custom coaster from the mold and begin enjoying your wedding flowers everyday!
Follow this tutorial for step-by-step instructions.
1 Pressed Floral | 2 Etsy | 3 Paige Lindsey Design | 4 Creative Market | 5 Beau Place Like Home | 6 Leman Floral | 7 Leman Floral | 8 Marie’s Floral Art | 9 Marie’s Floral Art