April Wedding Sneak Peeks!

April has been a fabulous month here at Botanica filled with amazing clients, fabulous planners, and beautiful events! Rather than feature one wedding today, I thought we'd share a little snippet from a few of this month's wonderful events! This is a combination of professional and iPhone pictures (so disregard the poor quality of our iPhone pics!) ;)

Tent at the Boca Pass Club in Boca Grande, FL

Church in Avon Park, FL

The Clearwater Hyatt
Photo courtesy of Djamel Photography

The Tampa Museum of Art
Photo courtesy of Jerry McGaghey Photography

Tent at Private Residence

Tent at The Gasparilla Inn in Boca Grande

The Beach Club at the Ritz Carlton Sarasota

We hope you enjoyed this little sampling - with more pictures and more professional pics to come soon! Thank you to all of the fabulous couples, planners and clients that allowed us to be involved in their big day! 

Xo - Zoë

Event Sneak Peek - Bern's Winefest!

April is not even over yet, but the month so far has been filled with fabulous events!! As much as we always love and post about weddings, we've actually been busy with other social events as well.

This past weekend we had the honor of being a part of the 4 Day Bern's Winefest in partner with Bern's Steakhouse. It was such a fabulous event filled with beautiful decor, delicious food and of course, WINE!

Below are a couple of sneak peeks from the different events we provided the floral and decor for. This event had a laundry list of fabulous event partners, but the event planner, Brooke Palmer, of RSBP Events was the leading lady managing and coordinating us all. Thank you Brooke for allowing us to be a part of this spectacular event! The images below are courtesy of another wonderful lady, Amy Pezzicara of Pezz Photo! 

Pictured above is the Quintessa Wine Dinner the first night. We provided a simple, yet
stunning design of cylinders filled with James Story Orchids with a pillar candle on top.
This created a beautiful setting for this special occasion.

Pictured above was the Havana Nights Cuban Themed Event. In relation to the theme of
the event, we suggested and provided an assortment of cigar boxes with boldly colored
arrangements of red roses. The lounge furniture was accented with our vintage Bergere Chairs.

Last but certainly not least, was the Moet Hennessy Tent at the Winefest. Inspired by crystal and 'bling',
we provided the stunning all white floral chandelier and several of our crystal brilliance
elevations and crystal spheres accented with silver vessels filled with beautiful white flowers. This
complimented the event design beautifully, we particularly love Brooke's selection of the crystal bling
leather sofas.

Again, a huge thank you to Bern's Steakhouse and Brooke Palmer for allowing us to be a part of such a spectacular event!

XO - Zoë

Wedding Sneak Peek - Ana and David

This past March we had the honor of being a part of Ana and David's wedding. It was a beautiful day at the Don CeSar Beach Resort, for such a wonderful couple.

Ana selected a color palette of champagne with silvers and golds, with her flowers in shades of pale pinks, off whites and ivories. We loved the idea of the mix of gold and silver, such a fun twist to use both metallics together. We used hydrangeas, garden roses, roses, ranunculus and tulips for this soft and romantic look. For this event, we provided not only the floral, but the lounge furniture as well.

We hope you enjoy the photos, courtesy of Briana and Brian from Divine Light Photography. In addition to having a fabulous photographer, Ana selected the ever so fabulous Jackie Ross, of Table 6 Productions to help manage the event!

Flowers, Flowers, everywhere!

Our favorite time of the year, wedding season! There is nothing we love more than our studio to be FILLED with flowers - literally! With our events for this weekend in full production, I thought I would share a sampling of the flowers we have in house, filling the design warehouse with their beautiful aroma!

From top left to right: Anemones with the black center, orange ranunculus,
blue hydrangeas, hot pink peonies (showing purple because of my camera),
coral garden roses (showing pink because of my camera), orange pin
cushion protea and white/green ruffled tulips

To our Brides this weekend - Happy Wedding Week! We hope you enjoy every moment of the weekend, starting with your rehearsal and rehearsal dinner this evening! See you tomorrow!! :)

XO - Zoë

Botanica Staff Date Night!

Working together is one thing, but we always feel it's necessary at times to take a step back and enjoy some time out of the office and away from the computers and design benches. 

Last night, we had a 'Staff Date Night Out'. Our staff (minus a few) and their spouses all attended a cooking class - we laughed, we made fun of each other's cooking skills and of course ate some delicious food! It was a great time and definitely fun for all. I thought I would take a moment to share some of the pictures from the evening.

On the menu: Potato, Bacon and Cheese Soufflé, Rice Pilaf and coq au vin,
with the perfect ending to the evening, creme brûlée! YUM!

From Left to right, top to bottom: Jess putting the finishing touches on her creme
brûlée, Tiffany and Jordan creating the coq au vin, Me (Zoe) making my delicious soufflés ,
Athena making the rice pilaf, Fiona and Athena enjoying a glass of wine and Ian
enjoying all of our hard work. :)

The entire crew, plus Chef Barbara!

Happy Wednesday! Now off to play with some BEAUTIFUL flowers we got in for this weekend's events!

XO - Zoë

We Need Your Vote!!!

The Society of American Florists asked Ian to be a part of a design competition, The Vase Off. A Project Runway Style Competition where he was asked to produce a bouquet that was a reflection of the 1920s era.

Between now and April 23rd the voting will be open. Please take a moment and cast your vote!! Vote for Ian and his "Josephine Baker" Bouquet!

Click HERE to vote!!

Thanks for your support!

Xo - Zoë

With Love, From Paris.

Owners of Botanica, Ian and Fiona Prosser departed from US soil last week to enjoy a little bit of business mixed with pleasure in the beautiful countries of France and Belgium. Yes, we've all been jealous while they've been away, living vicariously through their Facebook mobile uploads.

A trip regardless of it's purpose, wouldn't be complete without checking out local flower shops and gardens. We thought it might be fun to share a couple of their photos of beautiful flowers. Man do we wish the same pictures could be taken walking through the streets of downtown Tampa! ;)

Happy Good Friday and early Easter! From our family, to yours.

XO- Zoë

How to Give the Perfect Toast

Yesterday when meeting with a Bride about her upcoming nuptials, I had the pleasure of meeting her father, who shared with me an article he found on how to give the perfect toast! I loved this article and after being a guest or being a vendor involved in hundreds of weddings, I've seen the good, the bad and the ugly. The article is written by Jon Lovett, a White House speechwriter. I've paraphrased the article, giving the 5 rules, while at the same time, adding some advice of my own. I hope you enjoy and learn a little bit in the process. :)

Rule 1: Keep it Short - There are no bad 10-second toasts and there are no good 10-minute toasts. Remember 9 times out of 10, your guests have already indulged themselves in cocktail hour, or they are reuniting with friends they haven't seen in a while. Aka their attention span is non-existent. As much as they would love to hear your life story on how you and the groom met and grew up together - just pull some of the key moments that might cause a good laugh or the occasional tear.

Rule 2: Keep it Sweet - Simply put - No insults. No vulgar stories. Grandma doesn't appreciated hearing about a wild spring break trip where you and the Bride-to-be (aka her angel of a Granddaughter) first met. Anything you wouldn't feel comfortable telling your own parents about yourself, KEEP TO YOURSELF!

Rule 3: Test it Out - Any Best Man or Maid of Honor that has ever said to me "I'm just going to wing it" has crashed and burned. At least practice your speech once. And no, not in front of the mirror. Practice it with a friend who will give you HONEST feedback. If they don't laugh or think it's cute or a great speech, 150 other people most likely won't either.

Rule 4: Most Important - Be Sincere and specific. A toast is always a chance to say what we always mean to say to the people that we love. You wouldn't be selected for this job if you didn't mean something to either the bride or the groom. If the Bride has been an amazing friend, tell us why. Because she's been there with you through some of the most important moments in your life, or because she's helped you when no one else would... that's something Grandma will definitely want to hear, so feel free to share.

Rule 5: (I've definitely paraphrased here) THERE IS NOTHING WORSE THAN AN INTOXICATED SPEAKER!! Yes, you might feel liquid courage is something you need in order to stand in front of 200 people and talk. But for some reason I've found, people FILLED with liquid courage, lose complete track of time, can't gather their thoughts correctly, and honestly can just make a mess of their toast. Which, with all elements combined, equals the perfect youtube video. Enjoy a cocktail or two and raise your champagne glass, but leave the rest of the drinking until the cameras are no longer rolling.

To sum it up? Your ultimate goal? Is to NOT make the Bride and Groom or anyone else for that matter, do what is pictured below! :) Happy writing!

Xo- Zoë

The Garden Rose Phenomenon

There is nothing that makes our heart swoon like receiving a bunch of delicious garden roses! The cousin of the peony, as we like to call it. Garden roses are starting to out bloom peonies (pun intended) when it comes to its ever growing popularity! Why? Perhaps it's because they are available year round? Or maybe it's because girls are becoming more and more drawn to romantic and organically designed bouquets and arrangements.

We can't help but fall in love with garden roses. They are perfect for any occasion, smell absolutely amazing, and just look at them! They are stunning!

Whether they are paired with other flowers or simply created in a monobotanical design, in a bouquet or arrangement, we just can't get enough!

 

Bouquet images courtesy of MarthStewartWeddings.com, Oncewed.com, traceykumer.com

XO - Zoë