Brooch Bouquet - Getting Started

Making a brooch bouquet is certainly a bit of a commitment.  If you put in the time, though, you will create a piece that will not only look fantastic on your big day, it will be something you can use and remember for the rest of your life.

If you Google Image search "brooch bouquet" you will find all sorts of fantastic examples that may suit your tastes better than my bouquet.  Many used just one color, or style/size/metal etc. but I decided to go for a less uniform look.  As you can see in the photo above I filled in around the brooches with rick-rack flowers to make it look more full and add dimension and texture.

Getting Started

To start making my bouquet, I initially started by gathering all of the supplies I would need.  Brooches are clearly the most important!  I had a lot of fun asking family members (mostly grandmothers) for donations and I loved having a piece with a little bit of family history in the mix.  Looking back I wish I had taken a picture of each brooch and tracked where it came from, because no matter how easy you think it will be to remember a specific gift or special story, it gets tough when you're looking at 50 different brooches and trying to keep them all straight!  To make up the rest of the brooches I searched thrift stores and ebay, and had family members doing the same.  I really enjoyed the whole process, and always loved when I would see a new thrift store and could just stop in to take a peek - it's always more fun when you're on the hunt for something!  If you're not into all that digging I would stick with ebay, you can find lots of 50+ brooches at one time.  In a later post I will explain how I attached the brooches to the base of the bouquet.

Once you have your brooches in order, you should think about what you'll use to hold them all together as a beautiful wedding bouquet!  I bought a Styrofoam ball and cut it in half for the top, and used a Styrofoam cone as the handle.  It was lightweight (which is important because once you add all those brooches it gets quite heavy!) and kept it's shape perfectly.  I made mine months ahead of time so I didn't want it to get flat as it sat in my closet.  When you glue the two pieces together just make sure you use special Styrofoam glue - as far as my experience tells, nothing else works!  I covered both parts in fabric - a white, lacy fabric for the top and a gray fabric for the bottom.  Later I added ribbon and also a yellow fabric, but that will come later. 

For now start gathering those brooches!  Next week I'll explain in more detail how they all came together!

Here is a photo of my dad walking me down the aisle, bouquet in hand!

Please let me know if you have any questions!  I'll be posting more on making the bouquet next week.

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