The Wedding Chicks + O & the O + Lane Dittoe Fine Art Photography

There are times when I start on a bridal bouquet and something just feels right. It's like the stars have aligned, I've had the right amount of coffee, the songs on Pandora fit the mood, and it's as though the flowers I carefully chose at market grew in nature like they were meant to ultimately be in this particular bouquet, on this particular day. It reminds me a lot of painting. There were days when I would walk in my studio and it felt right in this inexplicable way. The paint mixed perfectly, the graphite on the canvas smeared just as I wanted it to without any effort, etc. This bouquet (directly below) was like that. Lane and Amy asked me how long it took me to make it (because you can't see it in scale, but that sucker was big) and I told them about 15 minutes. And during an "on" day, that's about what it takes. The flowers just fit with each other, nestling in like a couple that have been together for years and know exactly where their "nook" is.

When Amy of The Wedding Chicks - an incredibly impressive and kick a** woman - asked me to create a bouquet for their bouquet recipe series, I excitedly responded with when, where, and what color scheme? Amy said, "Why don't we do peach?". And here we are... The peach bouquet that put Oak & the Owl on the map, or at least is the beginning of having my work recognized. Lane Dittoe's photos are so gorgeous that they somehow, impossibly, make flowers more beautiful. His work is seriously so good that when I got these photos in my inbox I had to walk out of the room because I couldn't keep my language clean in front of Bass. ;-)

Now that all 3 of the peach bouquets have been posted on The Wedding Chicks blog, I thought I would share them all together. Here's the first one that has been "pinned" on The Wedding Chicks site alone, more than 24,000 times.

Below are the individual shots of each flower.

And these last two shots are the front and back of the bouquet. I asked Lane to photograph the back because it had it's own charm with the directional movement. I think the two side by side are really cool together. It's also a great way to show how I try to not force flowers to do something they don't want to do. These flowers came together this way because of their individual shape which I think is a really beautiful alternative to the typical perfectly round bouquet. But... I like those too as you will see below.

This (below) is the second of the bouquet series. Amy saw those balsa wood flowers and lotus pods sticking out of my kit and thought they'd look cool with some of the other smaller headed flowers. She asked if I could whip something up, and I did. She also asked for something smaller, that a more petite bride would/could hold, and with more of a rounded shape. It took me about 10-15 minutes to make and when I was done, I laid out the individuals for Lane to shoot and then we finished with the bouquet. It was actually a lot of fun laying out the flowers. A tiny bit of perfectionistic styling. Right up my alley. You can go to The Wedding Chicks to read their full post on it.

Below are some shots of the back. It's a little more wild. I guess like a mullet?

And here is the last of the 3 peach bouquets. I really love this one. There's something so sweet about it. We decided to do one last bouquet with the peonies, because you must employ peonies (especially coral charm peonies) to their fullest extent. I kept it a bit more contained than the first one and used fewer flowers. You can read The Wedding Chicks post on it too.

I hope you enjoyed seeing them all together. It was such a treat to go to The Wedding Chicks office and create these for them. And to have Lane Dittoe photograph them was the unexpected icing on an already amazing cake. Who knew a quick email and an under-utilized color direction would result in something with such appeal for brides. Well, Amy knew, because she's good like that. She and Jocey know what brides want, which is why The Wedding Chicks is so successful. I feel so lucky to be a part of their vendor family. This week they put me on as one of their "Hand Picked Vendors"! It was such an honor to be included with the amazing talent they have on their lists, I am beyond thrilled.

The first 3 months of Oak & the Owl have been a whirlwind and I'm excited to see what's next. (I wrote that last night, waiting to publish this post today. About an hour later I received the most incredible and unexpected opportunity for Oak & the Owl in my inbox. I cannot wait to share where we are going to be featured next!!! It was a serious "somebody's got to pinch me because I must be dreaming" moment.)

Thanks for visiting today! Check back next week for some more beauty.

Cheers!!