your preparation guide

before you begin

This guide walks you through the three days before your wedding — from picking up your flowers to packing them for the venue. Read it once now, then again the week of your wedding. You'll be glad you did.

Most couples spend a few hours across the three days with a friend or two. You don't need to be artistic - though don't let that stop you from using your own flair. You just need to follow the recipe, trust the process, and keep the flowers cool.

This schedule is based on a Saturday wedding with a Wednesday flower pickup (three days before). Different wedding day? Just shift everything back. 

1–2 weeks before

The week of your wedding is not the time to be hunting down cable ties. Get everything sorted now, while you still have headspace. Let future you relax.

confirm your flower order

Re-check your pickup day, and wholesaler location (with extra attention to opening hours!). Save the wholesaler's number in your phone. If the forecast is looking like a scorcher, message us — we can arrange to keep your flowers in the wholesaler's cool room and shift your pickup a day later.

gather your supplies

See the full supplies list at the bottom of this guide and tick them off as you go. Or add a Setup Kit to your order and skip the shopping entirely — we'll bundle the essentials with your flowers.

plan your workspace

Clear a big flat surface — kitchen bench, trestle table, dining table with something over it you don't mind getting wet. Figure out where your flowers will live between prep days (see storage below). Stock the fridge with snacks and drinks. You will forget to eat.

pro tip: Print this guide. Grab a different colour highlighter for each helper and mark who's doing what on each day. Hand them their highlighted copy when they arrive. They'll scan for their colour and won't need to ask you a thing.

storage: the make-or-break

Heat is the enemy, especially during the Australian wedding season. Everything you've prepped needs to live somewhere cool, dark, and out of direct airflow until you use it.

best options

A dark garage or laundry, kept as cool as possible. An air-conditioned room works — but not directly under the vent. The airflow damages petals. And away from direct sunlight, always — even filtered light through a window.

summer and heatwave protocol

Aussie summers don't mess around. Delicate flowers like waxflower can start shedding above 25°C. If your wedding falls during a heatwave, get in touch early — we can often arrange to hold your flowers in the wholesaler's cool room. You can shift your pickup to Thursday instead of Wednesday to reduce at-home storage time. If air-con is your only option, run it continuously. 

day 1 — three days out (prep day)

Today is about getting your flowers home, hydrated and starting to open. This is not a design day. It's a messy, satisfying, put-on-some-music kind of day. Let the flowers do the work.

time required

1–2 hours. A helper is nice but not essential.

what to do

Fill all your buckets and vases with clean, cool water. Add a drop of household bleach to each one — it keeps bacteria at bay. Flower food does the same job if you prefer.

Unwrap your flowers one bunch at a time. Pop on gloves and strip any foliage that would sit below the waterline — submerged leaves rot fast and foul the water. Re-cut each stem at a sharp angle, 2–3cm off the bottom, with clean sharp secateurs. Place each variety in its own labelled bucket. Trust us — so much easier than fishing through a mixed bucket tomorrow.

Set aside your hero blooms. Pick out the most beautiful roses, your best ranunculus, your nicest focal flowers. Put them in their own bucket, labelled BRIDE. You'll build your bridal bouquet last, on Day 3, and you do not want your best blooms ending up in a bud vase.

tips and watch-outs

Prep day is messy. Genuinely messy. Have garbage bags ready for the mountain of cellophane, foliage, and stem trimmings. If anything looks tired or bruised, don't panic — a deep drink overnight fixes most things. And if the flowers look less full than you expected, that's completely normal. They'll keep opening over the next 24–48 hours. By Day 3 you won't believe they're the same flowers.

 

day 2 — two days out (the big one)

Today you build most of your arrangements. Start with the easiest design first to get your hands moving and your confidence up.

Time required

A few hours, depending on your package size. Most arrangements take 10–20 minutes once you've got your eye in. You'll pick up speed fast — the first one takes the longest.

what to build today

Buttonholes, centrepieces and table arrangements, any large ceremony pieces, and bud vases. If you have time, also do the bridesmaids bouquets to take the pressure off tomorrow.

Leave for Day 3: your bridal bouquet (the flowers need one more day to reach full bloom).

helper strategy

This is the day to call in your people. Give each helper one type of arrangement — one person on boutonnières, one on bud vases. Repetition builds speed, and you'll finish in half the time. Good playlist mandatory.

reflexing roses

This is the one trick that makes everything look twice as lush. Reflexing means gently folding the outer petals of a rose backwards so it looks more open and full. Very on-trend, ridiculously satisfying. Search "how to reflex a rose" on YouTube — 30 seconds per bloom once you've got the hang of it.

as you finish each piece

Straight into water. Bouquets in a tall vase, arrangements in their final vessels. Move each one back to your cool storage spot. 

Any completed buttonholes or small wearable pieces can be popped into a Tupperware box and popped in the fridge.

 

day 3 — the day before

A lighter day. Build your bridal bouquet while the flowers are at their absolute peak, finish any fresh-flower accessories, and pack everything for transport.

build your bridal bouquet

This is The Moment. Use the hero blooms you set aside on Day 1. Work loose and airy — the bouquet will compress as you bind it. Bind with floral tape first, then cover with ribbon. Once it's built, pop it in a vase of fresh water in your cool storage. It'll happily live there until morning.

finish bridesmaids bouquets and any extras

If not built yesterday, make the bridesmaids bouquets now. Keep them noticeable smaller and simpler than bride's bouquet.

Any other extras can be made now, like hair pieces.

pack for transport

Grab some cardboard boxes and flip them upside down. Cut X-shaped slits in the base and push your vases through — instant stability. A few passes of tape over the tops of the vases and nothing's going anywhere. (Your wholesaler will often have spare boxes if you ask nicely.) Transport bouquets upright in tall vases of water — dump the water when you get to the venue. Pack a bucket of spares with all your leftover stems. These are gold for last-minute gaps. And throw together a supply bag: secateurs, ribbon offcuts, floral tape, pins, bleach, and a clean cloth.

Pro tip: Write a flowers drop-off list. What goes where, in what vessel, who's placing it. Hand a copy to whoever's doing the transport. 

 

wedding day

Wake up. Take a breath. You actually did it.

Your job today is... nothing. Hand everything to your transport crew and let them deal with the venue. You get ready. You drink the coffee. You have the day you've been planning.

If something wilts or breaks en route, that's what the bucket of spares is for. Your helper or venue coordinator can fix it in thirty seconds flat.

 

flower care notes

roses

Reflex the bigger roses for a fuller, more open flower head. If a bloom looks tight, warm water (not cold) encourages it to open. Remove lower thorns with a thorn stripper or the back of your secateurs — easier handling, fewer scratches.

ranunculus

Beautiful but so dramatic. The stems can droop under the weight of the bloom. If they curve heavily, thread a length of florist wire up through the stem to straighten them out. In hot weather, these get priority cool storage.

carnations

If they arrive looking tight, you can gently push them open with your thumbs. They're the only flower you can manhandle like this. Extremely hardy, incredibly forgiving — a first-timer's best bud.

stocks (when in season)

Available in winter and spring — not around in high summer. Beautifully fragrant and lush, but thirsty. Check water levels daily.

waxflower

Sheds in heat above 25°C. Keep cool, handle gently. 

seasonal substitutions

Bar just a few, most flowers are available seasonally. If your wedding falls outside their window, we'll swap them for something close in the same palette and let you know in advance. No surprises.

supplies

Add a Setup Kit to your order and skip this section entirely. Or source it yourself — here's what you need.

tools

Sharp secateurs or floral snips — Bunnings, or Daiso if you're on a budget. One pair per person helping, plus a spare. Floral tape (Spotlight or Lincraft). Bind wire (Spotlight). Pixie pins for boutonnières (Spotlight or Lincraft). Cable ties (Bunnings).

hydration and storage

At least 5–6 short plastic buckets, 1.5–2.5L — Bunnings, Kmart, or your nearest two-dollar shop. 3–4 smaller vases or mason jars for delicate stems, and to store your finished bouquets. Household bleach — one drop per bucket does the trick. Flower food sachets optional.

finishing

Double-faced satin ribbon — roughly 1.5m per draped bouquet, half a metre per wrapped handle with extra for trailing ribbons. Spotlight or Lincraft (or ask us for help sourcing). Keep a separate pair of scissors for ribbon — don't use your flower snips as they'll shred the ribbon.

You'll also need self adhesive floral tape, pins for buttonholes and securing ribbons, and floral wire and cable ties for emergencies.

practical extras (don't skip these)

Disposable gloves — your manicure will thank you. LOTS of garbage bags — you will not believe the amount of offcuts. Old towels for surfaces and spills. A sharpie for labelling buckets by flower type is helpful (hands off the bridal bouquet flowers!).

the Tables and All of It kits — additional

Waterproof tape to create a tape grid for your vases (or to secure chicken wire balls). Floral chicken wire or wet floral foam for structure. Vases for your centrepieces — your choice, your style. For large kits: two large urns or foam cages for ceremony arrangements, plus extra cable ties to secure them.

if something goes wrong

Something probably will. Almost guaranteed, actually. Here's why it won't matter.

A flower is bruised or broken. Snip it out. Grab a spare. Nobody — truly nobody — will notice.

The bouquet looks smaller than expected. Flowers open overnight. What looks tight on Day 1 will look lush by Day 3. Trust it.

A bloom has wilted. Re-cut the stem at a steep angle, submerge the whole flower head-down in cool water for 20 minutes. Most come back to life.

You're running out of time. Bud vases with 2–3 stems each look stunning, take 60 seconds, and fill gaps anywhere. They're your secret weapon.

You're overwhelmed. Put the snips down. Pour a glass of something nice. Come back in 20 minutes. The flowers will wait. They always do.