It's been a magical couple few weeks decorating some fabulous venues for Christmas including one of my absolute favourites; Cowdray House, Cowdray Park, Midhurst.
The Christmas tree was specially selected and cut from the Cowdray Estate and is a truly magnificent tree.
So, two fireplaces, five balconies and a huge tree later....
I was invited to design the flowers for a gorgeous event last Thursday and we created a wild and autumnal tablescape inspired by the views from the dining room window of Cowdray House, who hosted the event. Caper and Berry provided the fabulous food and hospitality.
The event was a party for many of the top wedding and event planners and, having installed the flowers, I rushed home to change and actually attended the event.
It was a great night with amazing food, a superb venue and great company.
Photos by the brilliant Kerry Jordan of Boo Face Photography
Bringing the outside in; Autumn Event Dinner at Cowdray House
It was a glorious Autumn morning for Krisztina and Graeme's wedding at Cowdray House on 8th October 2016.
If you look through this journal you may have seen that I was the florist for the very first wedding held at Cowdray House, at the end of June this year. Well, this wedding included the first actual civil wedding ceremony at the house.
Autumn is a great time to get married and at Cowdray House the views from the ceremony room out to the garden are spectacular with all of the colours of Autumn represented in the landscape.
The flowers also included colours from the Autumn landscape mixed with pink and peaches and the last flush of the English roses.
The ceremony room at Cowdray House
The wedding reception in Buck Hall, Cowdray House, Midhurst, West Sussex
It's been a really beautiful summer and I've been lucky enough to spend so much of it outside, arranging flowers, tending plants and watering (a lot for the potted plants that I sell at Cowdray Farm Shop) in the cool of the evening just before sunset; a magical time of day.
The summer season has been non stop this year and the event work, like the flowers, has been abundant.
For this event at Cowdray House I wanted to showcase the abundance of summer flowers and seasonal fruits and also to showcase a small selection of the huge variety of plants that I've been selling at Cowdray Farm Shop this summer; verbenas, abelias, pelargoniums, senecio, clematis, honeysuckle, crocosmia, dahlias.
A sprinkling of garden roses and a few unripe blackberries from my own woodland garden complete the look; the abundance of summer 2016.
The abundance of summer
Summer table centres
Garden flowers at Cowdray House
Freshly picked
It's been an extraordinarily busy Summer and I have some catching up to do on this journal. Apologies!
Now, I posted a photograph that I took of Miranda, my gorgeous bride whose reception was at Cowdray House at the end of June, but I didn't post any of my other photographs so I aim to address that in this journal entry.
It was a fabulous wedding and the Lewis family were an absolute dream to work with. It's always such a huge pleasure for me to work with such lovely people on these really important occasions in their lives. Helping to create great memories through flowers and styling, it's hard not to be swept up in the happiness wave. We became firm friends in the run up to the wedding and we've met up on several occasions since and I know we'll always stay in touch.
The Lewis's wedding was one of the first weddings that Cowdray House had hosted and Sian and Jayne, who hosted the weekend on behalf of the house, made sure it was a huge success. Jacaranda Catering provided the food and a team to run the event over the weekend, led by the amazing Minty Moore and I hear that the food was superb. If you're looking for a caterer for a wedding or an event, do get in touch with them, I often work with them on events and the clients are always really delighted with their excellent food and brilliant service.
My team were superb (Nia, Sue, Rob, Alyson and Stuart) and we had a great time making and installing the flowers. We all went on to make and install the floral decorations at another large private party the day after so it was a very busy few days, but fun too.
Here are a few of the photographs that I took on the morning of the wedding.
Happy memories.
Entrance to Buck Hall
Entrance Hall Flowers
The Morning Room
Morning Room Flowers
Buck Hall Wedding Breakfast
Candleabra in Buck Hall
Buck Hall
Miranda leaving for the church
Beautiful Miranda
St Mary's Church, Easebourne, Midhurst, West Sussex
Milk Churns down the Aisle of St Mary's
I'm finally catching up on my updates after what has been an extraordinarily busy summer at This Floral Life.
Our brilliant Midhurst caterers, Jacaranda Catering, were responsible for hosting the Cowdray Polo Club members enclosure at Cowdray Park on Gold Cup day and we were delighted to be invited to decorated the stand.
We used a selection of sunflowers (gold!), delphiniums, hydrangeas and foxtail lillies for the main displays with Louis Roederer champagne inspired arrangements on the bar.
The vintage van, which belongs to Jacaranda, was filled with seasonal British plants in yellow and white and was such a huge success that we've decided to hire it out for events and weddings, filled with plants which can be either hired or bought...more on that later!
Here are a few photos of the event.
