Weddings & Events in Brooklyn

Weddings & events in Brooklyn: choosing flowers for a Saturday date

The favourite US wedding day is a Saturday in October, September or June, and for weddings & events in Brooklyn only the June date falls inside the Northeast's peony weeks, late May to early June. The date decides the bride's flower first, then what to send if you can't make the ceremony, and only after that a gift for the couple's flat.

Peony weeks end in early June: what a Brooklyn bride carries next

A bride marrying on a June Saturday can still ask for peonies, since the Northeast's peony weeks run from late May into early June and the peony season is over soon after. A September or October bride can choose roses or protea instead.

One bridal bouquet pairs the two flowers directly: Duo of Peony Roses and Peonies sets a real peony beside a peony-shaped rose, so the difference is easy to see in the hand. Those peony-shaped roses are usually English varieties bred by David Austin, fuller and rounder than an ordinary rose. A French rose isn't a variety at all, it's a florist's technique: the outer petals are turned back by hand to open the bloom wider.

For a wedding past the peonies season, Wedding Bouquet Protea is the autumn-dated option in the same section. White and cream stay the easiest palette to match across a wedding party, and the Brooklyn catalogue carries lisianthus and hydrangea in those shades alongside the roses.

Guests who can't make the wedding have an alternative to a card: a basket of lilies that stands on its own at the restaurant, no vase needed. Lilies are greenhouse-grown, so the basket can go on the table in any month of the year, peony season or not.

Lily pollen stains fabric on contact, which matters near a wedding dress or a dinner jacket, so florists remove the anthers once the flower has opened and before the basket goes out. The delivery time at the restaurant is set with the host stand rather than guessed at: before the first toast, around dessert, or just before the couple walks up to speak.

An order for a set date is accepted to any zone in the city, and the earlier it's placed, the more slots are still open as the wedding weekend fills up. The courier sends a photo of the finished basket before leaving, so a change can go in before departure, and the whole order can still be edited up to six hours before delivery.

Wedding flower delivery in Brooklyn works the same way for any restaurant or venue address: the date and zone are set at checkout, and specifics are on the delivery page.

A gift that outlasts the wedding weekend works better sent to the couple's flat than to the venue. Jumilia buds open to about seven centimetres, white at the base with a pink edge, and with fresh water and a trim they stand up to two weeks in a vase. The catalogue lists it as 51 Jumilia in Airy Wrapping.

If the couple has a cat at home, jumilia is the safer gift over a lily basket, since lilies are toxic to cats. For a Russian-speaking couple, what a Brooklyn recipient expects also includes an odd number of stems in the arrangement.

Beyond jumilia, the gifts for the couple section holds the lily baskets from the toast above as well, for anyone still deciding between the two.

Choosing where to start comes down to the guest list. Anyone planning the ceremony itself starts with the bridal bouquet. The wedding party chooses from wedding bouquets, and anyone sending flowers instead of attending, or marking the day after the fact, looks at the wedding section built for gifts from guests.