A question many brides ask themselves- “Can I DIY my own wedding?”.

The answer: maybe.

Do you really want to? It’s a lot of work- but some people are up for the task.

You don’t NEED floral experience to pull this off. If you are considering DIY-ing this, I already assume you believe in your creative ability to DIY giant tasks. And you’re probably okay with everything not looking like it was done by the top-florist in your region. Youtube is an endless encyclopedia of visual learning, and google can handle most of your flower-specific questions.

Here are some extra things to ask yourself:

• Do you have two full days before your wedding to set aside for processing/preparing flowers, and designing arrangements?

• Do you have a cold space to store flowers and arrangements?

• Do you have the space to design arrangements?

• Is it safe to have flowers in your home, around your pets, children, or allergy-ridden partner?

• Will you be able to have them delivered and placed before the event by yourself or a designated person? (Leave at least 2 hours for this)

• Do you have the space to store containers before the event? Do you have time to clean them and prepare them with mechanics to hold an arrangement?

• Have you ever designed with flowers before or maintained bulk amounts of cut flowers?

• Do you have somewhere to acquire quality, bulk flowers before the day-of?

• Will you be able to guarantee your flower or color choice with these flowers? If not- is this okay?

• Is anyone willing to help you with the designing/transportation? Are they reliable?

• Do you have a planner who is willing to help with placing?

• Do you need to “flip” the ceremony space into the reception space?

• Will someone tear-down and bring the arrangements home at the end of the event, or will you have to?

There are options out there for sourcing your bulk flowers. Trader Joe’s offers decent quality flowers at a reasonable price. I believe (don’t hold me on this if I am wrong) that you have color or flower choice. I think you are stuck with whatever shipment they get in that morning.. Maybe they will pre-order specific products at your location, if you are lucky.

Stores like Costco, Sam’s Club, or your local grocery store’s sometimes offer wedding flowers or bulk flowers in their floral department. I have not personally ordered from Costco myself, however I have seen some less than impressive reviews online of quality. I think some locations of Costco will even make your bouquets and bouts.. again, I wouldn’t make this a top choice.

Grocery stores can have decent selection- it really just depends on your local store. Some great designers work at grocery stores, but I don’t know too much about wedding orders from them.

If you are in Seattle, the Seattle Growers Market offers public hours, they are currently on Friday mornings. You can shop their floor, but the public can not place special orders.

Another option is your local farmers market or public market. Some vendors may let you place bulk orders, and some may be willing to bring you buckets of specific flowers/colors.

We offer custom DIY orders, where we will curate your floral order as if we were building it, and deliver it to your door. This means you can pick what flowers and colors you want and get some free advice about how much to order. This service is available to King County and the surrounding areas. To plan your DIY order, send me an email at erica@bloombratsbotanical.com