Cheap Centrepieces That Look A Million Dollars

Hi, I thought I would share something with you that happened twice over the last 2 days. Firstly, I had a bride who was budget and while wanting to have a beautiful centrepiece she couldn't find anything that looked great but didn't look cheap. She was becoming very disheartened because her dream wedding wasn't coming together as she hoped and rather than being excited she was becoming upset. Now, I find this a lot with brides, obviously because there are so many expenses with wedding, brides start to feel the budget pinch early but I want to share with you a tip that will ease the financial pressure.

If you want a beautiful centrepiece without the big cost and your using flowers....the secret is not to use a lot of flowers. Instead choose either a single flower or 3 stems of flowers only and mix it with things such as sticks or willow. Last Friday afternoon I setup a gorgeous centrepiece made with 5 small antheriums with 4-6 small dark chocolate thin bamboo sticks in a round vase approx 15cm high. The vase was placed onto a mirror base with t-lites around it. It looked amazing...unfortunately I didn't take a photo!!! Sorry! Now my guess with the t-lites and the mirror it may have cost $15-$20 at the most including the flowers which will be the major part of the cost. Now for flowers I suggest going to the wholesaler, now normally you have to be a florist or in the industry but I know at our wholesale market they don't even ask! But if your not sure try to see if anyone in your family knows a florist and ask if they will buy them for you. Its worth the effort because the markup on flowers from the wholesale to retail is normally double...at least! Or if you cannot get to the wholesaler go to your local market. Here in Adelaide we have a farmers market on Sunday. Its runs from 6am-1pm and local farmers sell their produce direct to the public and that also includes flower wholesalers. They dont necessarily have the variety but the prices are amazing!!

Now going back to making the centrepiece i described, its a definately possible to do it yourself and also to do it the the day before as well. The vase was a simple round one ....nothing special at all (florists hire vases) or you can pickup cheap vases at places like Target and Walmart.

One thing that will also help your centrepiece is to pin spot them from a light above. What this means is above each centrepiece there was a light that shone directly onto it which gave it a great look. ...now this depends on your venue so make sure you ask if they can do this when checking out reception possibilities. Now if you don't have this don't worry because the t-lites will have a similar effect but from the base of the centrepiece instead.

So goodluck, I'll actually writing a DIY centrepiece e-booklet to show you how to do some of these. I'll keep you updated and let you know when its finished!

Good luck!