To DIY or Not to DIY

So, in this whole wedding planning process there are many, many (expensive!!) decisions to be made in a variety of areas: venues, attire, food and beverage, favors ... and flowers. Now, being a theatrical props artisan I have a wide variety of hands-on skills, including the occasional floral (albeit fake) arrangement. This leads me to consider the idea of doing my own flowers for the wedding.

Now before everyone freaks out and says "oh, NO! you couldn't possibly do THAT!" understand that I have considered this carefully. I have access to the theatre's prop shop where A) I can store the buckets of flowers in preparation for the arranging; B) there is a large expanse of work space for the actual arranging; C) the finished arrangements can be stored (the A/C is turbo so it's quite cool, plus there is a fridge that I can remove everything else from and set the temp to a decent flower storage temp). Since we're getting married at the theatre there will be no troublesome transportation of the flowers the day of the wedding, they'll simply be loaded on a rolling cart and wheeled down to the lobby.

In talking about style for the wedding Bill and I agree that we like a more "wild" look to the arrangements. I'm thinking simple, hand-tied bouquets made from seasonal, locally-grown flowers purchased from a vendor at the farmer's market (we would make arrangements in advance for quantity we need, of course). I feel very confident that I have the skills to actually create what we're looking for. We'd have the cost of finding our own vases, sure, but part of my job is finding things for cheap! (And I have access to an entire prop storage room ...)

The only real question here is whether doing the flowers myself is too stressful. The nature of flowers requires that the work be done the day before the wedding. Do I really want to have that much to do so close to the actual event? Would having a creative activity actually end up being a theraputic escape?

In the end, I realize that there's no way I could do ALL the flowers by myself. Accomplishing this task will certainly require the help of a few other volunteers (I'm willing to bribe people with chocolate and beer!) Also, it might be wise to consider doing only PART of the flowers myself, say I do the bouquets and corsages and buy the centerpieces or vice versa. I plan to pick up some flowers at the farmer's market soon to do a little test-run, just to make sure I'm not crazy. I'll be sure to post photos of the results!!

In any case, I'm pretty serious about this idea. I mean, really, what good is being a props person if you don't get to use your skills for personal gain??