Always better with a model...

We take hundreds of pictures every week. Almost nothing is sent out with at least a mini photo shoot. It is just as important to have a lovely portfolio of our paper designs as we use to have for our fresh wedding designs.

If rushed for time we snap our designs in our backrop room with a vintage shabby chic dresser as our back drop.
Mel found the dresser while thrifting and she added a few coats of paint and a bit of glaze to add some distress, giving it the lovely shabby look.

However, we have found the photos Etsy favors are with a model. This meaning, most all of our front page or Etsy newsletter photos have been the ones chosen with a model in them.
So, we do take the time to photograph with Iris as our model. Often a white background is favorable for treasuries, we dress her up in a white dress or pretty blouse and she is off and running for our photos.

This week we were able to wrangle her in for a mini shoot before we hit the post office with our finished orders. She never likes her face to be included .. sometimes it has to be .. for example our halos ! but for these shots we just cut her off at the chin .. so to speak ;)
 Here are a few beauties to share with you.

Enjoy!

A wonderful first year!

   Though we have been in the wedding business over 17 years this was our first year of creating primarily alternative bouquets. We've loved the fresh weddings we had this year as well but we have fallen in love with Etsy and our alternative bouquets.

We have shipped our bouquets all over the world. Many bouquets have gone to Australia and the USA, we have shipped to Gibraltar and the United Kingdom.
We were blessed with a feature in Vogue Conde Nast publishing BRIDES magazine August/ September issue in the UK.

We have been featured on many large and small blogs alike, each one we are grateful for.

Below: David Tutera, It's a Brides life,  August 5th 2012 http://itsabrideslife.com/category/favors/page/2/

 

Below: The Off Beat Bride  http://offbeatbride.com/2012/07/colorado-vegan-vintage-wedding

As well as The frosted Petticoat http://www.frostedpetticoatblog.com/2012/09/awesomely-offbeat.html

And today you can find us on at KJ & Co's Etsy Roundup

 http://www.kjandco.ca/2012/12/etsy-round-up-cheery-yellow-wedding.html

Weddings = busy hands !!

Wow, it has been a crazy week! We are trying to tie up loose ends this week.
Aim will be manning the shop next week while I take some time away. We will not be designing next week and Aim will be answering email's but she mostly likely will not quote weddings.

Aim was pleasantly surprised at the cost of shipping Claire's bouquet to Australia, we managed to ship it small packet - 6- 10 day's for less then $50.00 YEEEEHAWW!!  NOW, this did not come with a tracking number (always makes us nervous) but the alternative is shipping over sea and that can take up to 10 weeks.. once the package is on the water you have no clue where it is until it makes landfall in Australia.

Soo lets post some pretty pictures of our work, you always like that :)




This bouquet was a sample for a potential client .. we have not heard back so we are figuring it is a no - go .. such is life :)

This was Claire's bouquet which she will receive soon!! 

These are our handmade paper pine cone flowers - Australia is very picky and we did not want to chance our package been confiscated for natural product in customs. Better safe then sorry!

This is Claire's hair clip we created for her

This was a wedding we created for Jamie from Braintree M.A. in the USA,

it should arrive to her in the next 10 day's.

This was a bridal bouquet we created with a matching boutonniere for our reporter friend Kayla in MillBrook N.Y.

We had some other exciting stuff this week and more pictures! 

I will tell you about it in the next post :) 

  

A bouquet full of meaning

Today we were working on Claire's bouquet.
She is one of our Australian brides. Just to catch you up to speed, Australia's second wedding season is in what would be their Spring. Our September thru November is the perfect time to wed due to cooler temperatures. Soo we have been having a booming summer working with our Australian brides!
Claire's bouquet has been a work in progress for over a month.
She has been collecting materials for us to incorporate into her bouquet : buttons, pin's, fabric, lace from grandmothers, sisters and other family members. Sheet music will be made into flowers and fabric from Japan will bring hints of colour to the bouquet.
Claire has packaged it all up and sent it to us here in Canada. (A 10 day postal journey)
We received the package yesterday with wonderful instructions and guidance.
Today was Day 1 of  3.

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

We are still away's a way from completion but we think it is progressing nicely!

More pictures tomorrow!

Enjoy!

Bailie's Alternative wedding

It's been a little while but we have come with pictures!
Bailie was an Etsy client of ours from the USA (we - being in Canada). She was so kind to send along a thank you and some images to share with us.
Bailie is stunning! and of course she is the one in Blue!
Enjoy the photos!

Thank you Bailie!

Aim & Mel

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

Guess where you can spot us!!

We made it into an Etsy Weddings email !!
Here is the link : Etsy Weekly picks : Princess Grace

Also you can find us down town Hamilton tonight at the Beehive collective group gathering with the Etsy Canada team! We had such a great time last month in Toronto soooo now we can't wait to dig in and get crafty with the Hamilton Art community and Etsy artists!

A little eye candy for today:
We have gone Aqua with our handmade Pearls and Poppies bouquet.
Let us know what you think!

funny thing just happened

She loves to creep into photo shoots ..
LOL

Love this bouquet?

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

Carly's getting married !

Yes, she is!
She will be wed in November but things need to happen on our side a bit quicker because her bouquet will be taking the long journey from Canada to Australia .. boy do we wish we could deliver this in person!

Shipping to Australia is either fast or very, very, very slow. Typically it is over $100.00 USD for your bouquet to arrive in 6 - 10 day's.
We will cover the overage which sometimes happens. If you have some time then shipping will be most likely $55.00 but it can take over 3 months to reach Australia .. which can be painful to wait on !

Here is a little insight .. Carly has sent us images of the 2 gowns she will be choosing from. These gowns are so beautiful they make us want to get married again somewhere tropical so that we can spend a day wearing them!! AHH MAA ZING!!

We vote YES! .. not helpful I know but we really love both!!

She will also be wed on the "Hamilton Island" AUS  and this too looks AHH MAA ZING!!
Here are the links if you want to check it out!
Bear in mind it is a little different then what you will find in Hamilton Ontario :0 but it is fun to think Carly's bouquet will be made in Hamilton Ontario and will be used in Hamilton AUS.

THE LINKS:
Hamilton AUS and here too http://www.hamiltonislandweddings.com.au/

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

Poppy & Pearls

   They are finally here!
After much planning we have produced our first full poppy bridal bouquets!
You can shop our Poppy & Pearls bouquet's at our Etsy store.
SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS 

  Of course we will be combining our poppy with other flowers like we have done in our theatrical "snow white/huntsman" bouquet but our first step with a new product is to create a single variety bouquet.
Iris my bella helped me with the images so that you can see the proportion
 We will be exploring the colour palette of red and Aqua a bit more over the week - we will post pictures of our playfulness - feel free to send us your comments :)

Also, tomorrow we will be spending time working on our ranunculus - hopefully things will move smoothly with those and we can show you a full bouquet by the end of the week.

We will post pictures of the Poppy & Pearl a little later this evening!

Meet:  Scarlet & Ruby from the Poppy & Pearls series

Meet l'Orange :) our Mango & Pumpkin coloured Poppy & Pearls bouquet

Yummy wedding florals !

A whirlwind of activity in the Etsy shop this week.
Sometimes we receive orders right away, sometimes we converse with a bride and it can take a few weeks to find the perfect floral plan and sometimes we write quotes but nothing comes to fruition - and that is all the way things work.
Happly, we have been steadily working on Jolene's wedding florals.
We are totally in love with her vintage romance palette. Her bouquets are all finished and we are just following up with the boutonniere and corsages. Jolene is amazing - we truly adore her!! WE have fallen head of heels in LOVE with this Long Island New Yorker :)

Here are some images of our work so far.
Iris was gracious enough to pose with Jolene bouquet so that we can have a scale photo for Jolene.
pic 1 - palette
pic 2 - bridal bouquet
pic 3 - maids bouquets
pic 4 - wedding party collection


Enjoy!

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

A few projects on the go

Soo, we have a few projects on the go this week.

Faithfully we have been collecting vintage trims and lace for a wedding we are working on. I am happy to say we have all the components and will be assembling the bouquets tomorrow.
Our bride has the most beautiful palette of seafoam green, pale peach, pale pink and vintage creamy tones for her wedding colour plan.  Though the maids bouquets will be more or less neutral with creamy tones and white paper flowers, their bouquets will also feature tea dyed lace.

We spent some time today tea-dying the lace and sun drying it.. it is lovely!!!
Our bride will carry a bouquet of paper flowers mixed with vintage fabric flowers, the base of her bouquet will be creamy white tones and each of her handmade vintage fabric flowers will have details of her colour scheme. You will find tucked into the centre of each flower a vintage lace coloured floret - seafoam green, pale pink and pale peach. For the bridal handle we will be trimming it with tea dyed lace.

On the other spectrum we are also working on a vibrant bouquet of handmade paper ranunculus and poppy.
Earlier in the week we hand cut and dyed the poppy petals in shades of scarlet and pumpkin. They are dry and are ready to be assembled. We are also in the midst of assembling our orange ranunculus.

Here is a sample of the poppy and ranunculus prototype.

Enjoy!

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

Jordans Bouquet

We had quoted this week on a Wedding package from Jordan. Jordan had already placed her deposit for her flowers at a fresh wedding florist in her area but she fell in love with our alternative blooms. She inquired about a refund but it seems she would loose her deposit so she has elected to keep her bridesmaids and such with the fresh flowers and go with an Alternative Blooms bouquet for herself!!

We ARE SOOOOO delighted to create her bridal bouquet! It is a great honour to have her choose our design over a fresh bouquet.

We have complete the bouquet and we are sharing some pictures below before we send it Jordan's way.

Jordan will be married in just a few short weeks and we can't wait for her to show off her bouquet!!

Enjoy the photos!

SHOP ALTERNATIVE BLOOMS

AB

Poppin up all over!

   Every once in a while we stumble upon someone who has tuned into Alternative Blooms and loves them just as much as we do.
You can find our work featured here on the FABULOUS Valorie Clark Photography blog site.
If you are looking for a US. photographer who shoots "outside the box" Valorie just may be your girl!

This week we will be visiting a new and unique shop in Waterdown, Ontario where we hope to sell some of our home decor items. We have some wedding work on the go and we will be out searching for the perfect Vintage Brooch details.
We will tell you more about the Shop tomorrow!

Enjoy your day!

AB gals

A bushel and a Peck

We had a wonderful afternoon with the family. Dad was is in a great mood and loved our card.
We picked up a musical card which rang out in a vintage voice " I love you a bushel and a peck, a bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck" .
My kids were a bit perplexed at first but I knew as soon as I heard that darling vintage voice sing that playful song - DAD would love it!.
I can just imagine Dad as a young boy singing that song as he skipped down the street of Dundas. It is something he may have listened to his Mom sing. My Mom certainly new the words as soon as the melody hit her ears.
Dad smiled when the music started playing and after he closed the card he looked at me and said it was something special.
Dad does not have very many lucid moments anymore but I would consider this a special moment.

YAY for Dads!

We hope you had a lovely day too.

The Alternative Blooms Gals

Vintage flowers ready for shipping

Ready for shipping!

Sarah's flowers are ready for shipping.
She upsized our vintage blooms to work with her vase (see previous post) or West Elm 's link - WEST ELM
We think it will be Amazing!
What do you think?