Pink and stretchy in St. Petersburg

I was in St. Petersburg, Florida for business, sort of — suffice it to say, I was there for reasons completely unrelated to flowers or weddings. But when you see something, you gotta act on it, and if I didn’t take pictures of this here party for you, would you have all these great pictures to get ideas from? Not at all. By the way, the above arrangement is plenty beautiful and very simple — all it is is a floating candle in a cubed vase, with colored glass pebbles at the bottom, surrounded by rose petals. But by no means is this all I saw.

It turned out this event was Sojourn 2008 for WEDU, West Central Florida’s PBS station. And please do not think that I designed any of the decorations pictured — I did not. The spectacular decorations were all done by a company called conceptBAIT. However, they are my pictures. If you want more…

This little arrangement was one of the more simple ones of the evening. Its a good one for a cocktail table, I think — roses, those cool twigs, with a foot of moss.

This arrangement was actually the one that had caught my eye. I was on my way to the Starbucks on the lobby floor of the Hilton St. Petersburg Bayfront when I saw this display. Can we say…super cool? And, if you’re not sure what this display is depicting, that would be the Eiffel Tower, France’s most recognizable landmark. This party’s theme, after all, was a sojourn to France.

Ah, more spectacular arrangements. Those would be sprigs of orchids — forgive me, but I’m not sure what kind — in glass vases, with more pink colored glass along the bottom.

What was most unusual about this party — at least to me — was the fabric used for the seat covers and tablecloths. They appear to be spandex, actually. I’ve never seen such a thing. I think, for a party like this one, its appropriate — the spandex makes everything look more modern and almost spacey. For a wedding? I’m not sure. But that’s just me.

Even more spectacular were the arrangements used for what I assume were the bigwigs’ tables — you know, the VIPs, the big donors, the station’s management, etc. Because, yes, those would be a French mannequin torsos (French, it seems since they seemed to be quite hourglass shaped) used as the vase, decorated with pink fabric, feathery fringe, blue peacock feathers (I think) and orchids. Major props to the designer who thought of this, seriously. Although, I don’t know if I love the narrow stand for this mannequin. Parties tend to include alcohol, and I can just imagine what one drunken bump would do to this arrangement…

Finally, the outer tables are decorated with the same type, although shorter, vase arrangements as the one I previously described, plus smaller, cubed arrangements of pink roses, red roses (which you can barely see behind the pink roses) and another flower I can’t quite identify. I don’t know about anyone else, but I would have been happy with any one of these arrangements, much less all four of them. But I’m a simple gal.

Seeing as how this was a fundraising event for a PBS station, I daresay this party was decorated as a donation. That’s one heck of a donation, but its worth it to get the type of exposure that comes with a party attended by rich donors and various other media types. Maybe I’m completely wrong, but I daresay a party like this would cost in the ballpark of $35,000 or more. (In none of these pictures, did I describe the walls, which were also covered in black and white fabric) That doesn’t even include the bridal party flowers (which are labor intensive) that are included with wedding events.

If you want to check out more pictures of this event, including the actor and actress dressed up as Marie Antoinette and King Louis (I think) who were a scream, click here.
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Color indecision at the Ramada Suites in Covina

Look. Do us all a favor. If you’re having a big party, choose one color. If you like pink, go with pink. Or, if you like baby blue – go with the baby blue. Both are great colors. But the two should never be paired together outside of a nursery, but maybe not a personal nursery, since that baby may not know if s/he is supposed to be aligning him/herself with the pink or the blue. Anyway, just choose one, especially since the hotel may not have napkins that are your exact color of pink or blue.

This was an 18th birthday party/debut, but I could’ve sworn it was a baby shower for boy and girl twins.
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Double duty day

I know I’ve mentioned before that I used to work for my mom, the florist. I never did much floral design myself, but became an expert of sorts in draping, which she uses for her various weddings and parties. Anyway, lately, she’s been asking me for help with some of her bigger events. I actually did most of this work last night (I did, after all, have to work today) but went back to take pictures with her camera and my camera. (My mom seems to think that because I took a photography class, my taking the pictures is better.) Here are some of the photos:

The party was an 18th birthday debutante ball-type of deal. Filipinos tend to do these up really elaborate, and this is possibly one of the best examples of really elaborate. This scene here was just the entrance. I didn’t include it, but there was actually another one of those tall arrangements at the flanking the other side of the room entrance.

This is, obviously, the main focal point of the room, what we call a head table and backdrop. For some Godforsaken reason my mom had shown these folks pictures of work done by another company that was gaudy, pre-done and dripping with silk flowers. The family wanted us to copy those pictures, for some odd reason, but whatever – I did it my own way anyway. Besides, I knew what they wanted – real gold, real flow-y, real elaborate. Most of the material used is organza, English netting, plus this really soft gold, glittery netting that I love to use. My mom makes her own knots and all the flowers are real. By the way, is that photo lopsided or what?

I just had to include a photo of the regular tables. The family rented the cream-colored, organza tablecloth overlays for each of the tables, plus white seat covers, from my mom. Of course, you couldn’t really see the seat covers in these pictures. I just want to point out that each table had several votive candles, a program featuring that picture of the debutante that was blown up for the entrance, plus a glass rose as a giveaway. Dude, this is an 18th birthday party, not a wedding – remember that.

Ah yes, and this is the cake table. Also done up with that gold netting, organza, English netting and plenty of real flowers, mostly stargazer lilies, rose petals on the cake table and stephanotis in the cake. The cake was really tipsy, though – every time someone stepped on the riser (yes, the head table and cake table were on risers), the top layer would shiver.

So there’s a quick rundown of some of the work I used to do on a regular basis. The designing is pretty cool – there’s nothing better than working under deadline to finish something you can see and feel later on. I don’t miss doing the grunt work – planning Saturday itineraries, being short, therefore being the one to load arrangements and equipment into the van, especially in really hot weather (why is it there are more weddings during the summer?!), looking up directions, especially for my mom who hates to take the freeway (somehow, she makes it work). But having woked on, say, an average of three of these type of weddings/parties a month over five years, you can see why I opted for the park near the ocean on the night of a blue moon in a simple, store-bought, white dress with a bouquet picked from a garden just 30 minutes prior when I got married. (P.S. I added the copyright watermarks and made the pictures as small as possible so that they won’t get jacked. If you only knew how many times people have taken pictures without permission just to try to imitate…..man.)
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