How to tie a boutonniere
If you are looking to DIY certain items for your wedding, boutonnieres can be a great place to start. While they might be small items, they are critical in adding on your wedding’s aesthetics and come with a variety of options for customization. And to top it all, learning the basics is very easy.
While boutonnieres can be made from a range of materials such as brooches, buttons, fabric and flowers, in this tutorial, I will only teach you how to make flower boutonnieres. For the flowers, I suggest that you go for one with a big head such as a miniature calla lily or a rose as these can survive continuous handling. Ensure that you have extra flowers for practice if you plan on making boutonnieres a day before your wedding.
One of the key considerations you should make when making your wedding boutonniere are your ingredients. These will be determined by the aesthetic of the groom’s attire and wedding. Ensure that your boutonniere accents and complements other existing elements nicely.
Steps
Step 1
Start by gathering all your ingredients. My advice is that you select four textures with three crucial elements: the focal flower, the texture and the backing. For example, you can have ranunculi as the focal flower, while snowberry and sage can be used as texture and backing respectively.
Step 2
Work on your focal flower since it needs to withstand a day and night of pictures and dancing. If you are using the ranunculus flower, strengthen it by wiring the stem until it pokes the flower’s head and then cut the wire according to the stem’s length.
Step 3
Make a miniature bouquet by placing all your back leaves together. Proceed to work on the texture and make sure you stagger them to ensure they do not maintain the same height.
Step 4
Take your focal flower and place it at the bouquet’s centre. Take a floral tape and use it to wrap all the ingredients together. Ensure that you wrap the tape tightly around the bouquet three times and leave the bottom of the stems exposed. Cut off any excess tape.
Step 5
Finish up your boutonniere using a neutral ribbon. Some key examples you can use for this step include organic cotton or silk ribbons. Use the ribbon to tie a knot around your bouquet and then proceed to trim off the edges. To gain a simple and clean look, you can use hot glue to wrap the ends to the back.