Wedding Dress Ball – Memphis Flyer

Kristin Wolter-Canfield, owner and creative director of Everbloom Designs and also one of the key vendors at the Wedding Dress Ball, takes her passion for art and design into the artful composition of flowers (or any object, for that matter) when called to use her intuitive eye in photo and set styling. She has filled many tabletops with her signature floral arrangements, but today, she shows us how to make a floral arrangement you can wear.

Here, Kristin is wearing the gorgeous crown of flowers she created in the step-by-step tutorial below, just in time for wedding season and for those attending the Wedding Dress Ball taking place this Saturday.

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Materials Needed

Sharp scissors or floral snips
Floral tape
2 Floral wires (22 gauge or similar)
Flowers: Used in this DIY: local Daffodils and Ranunculus, Wax flower, Garden roses, Spray roses, and foraged greenery.

Directions

Choose the flowers you want to use and snip them leaving a 2-3 inch stem and removing all greenery from the stem. Be sure and wire and tape any heavier bloom like roses.

Gather small bouquets and tape them together with the floral tape, snipping the ends to make them even.

You will end up with several clusters.

Join your two wires together with floral tape and continue to tape the length of the whole wire to create one long wire to fit around your head.

Measure your head by bending it to the shape of your head and loop one end of the wire.

Now lay out the clusters along the wire the way you would like them to look.

Start attaching the clusters with the floral tape starting slightly above the loop in the wire. (This can be tricky but you get the hang of it 🙂 ) All clusters going the same direction.

Once all the clusters are attached add a few stems of greenery to the end going int he opposite direction to finish it off. Make any adjustments that need to be made.

Place the crown on your head again and join the wire and loop together. Voila!

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I also went through the steps with Kristin for my own flower crown in a purple theme. Now I feel inspired to create one for any outdoor party this spring and summer.

Thanks Kristin!

See more of her work on her website or at the Wedding Dress Ball as she will providing the floral displays for the event. Kristin will also be offering classes soon at City & State on Broad Avenue.

On April 18th, Memphis will host the first Wedding Dress Ball in the U.S. Known and held overseas in the United Kingdom, the trademarked event is a party where, simply put, women get an excuse to wear their wedding dress again.

“All of the fun, great food, dancing; none of the pressure,” says Brittney Andres-Rossi of Over Easy Events. When describing the origin of the idea before finding anything of its kind, she explained, “I was attending a friend’s wedding admiring her wedding dress with a table of ladies – the details, the buttons. We then talked about our own wedding dresses, continuing on for almost an hour. If we talked that long about them, I thought, ‘Why not wear them again?’”

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With the Wedding Dress Ball, attendees can revive that feeling of grandeur in a dramatic gown, whether it’s the dress from that wedding day, their dream wedding dress, a creatively altered wedding dress, a ball gown, or a bridesmaid’s dress.

When Brittney sought a venue for an event like this, she immediately thought of Propcellar Vintage Rentals and the open warehouse space. “It has that certain modern feel that I wanted, and I couldn’t imagine [the party] anywhere else,” says Brittney. Propcellar owner Karlee Hickman recently renovated the space for storing her vintage props but also designed it to host special events.

Event sponsor Maggie Louise Bridal Boutique will be assisting those in the category of attending with their “dream wedding dress.” Owner Molly Farrell is hosting trunk shows and sample sales leading up to the event. The boutique also carries bridal accessories like jewelry, headpieces, and sashes to help revamp one’s wedding dress look or create a look they didn’t have a chance to wear before.

Overall, the event is a reason to celebrate something – being married, single, or divorced. “Someone recently divorced said they are coming to celebrate their freedom,” says Brittney smiling with admiration. Plus, the event raises money for charity. This year, the event will benefit St. Mary’s Soup Kitchen which serves meals to the poor and homeless in downtown Memphis. It is the oldest continuously operating soup kitchen in the country.

Other vendors and partners include Everbloom Designs and CFY Catering. Kristin Wolter-Canfield of Everbloom Designs will be providing the floral designs. CFY Catering will serve hors d’oeuvres and colorless cocktails to avoid wedding dress stains. Event activities include mad-lib vow renewals, a “wedding party pose” photo booth, and hand-lettered anniversary henna tattoos by Baltic Studios Calligraphy.

Limited tickets are on sale now. Purchase them at www.weddingdressball.org or www.weddingdressball.eventbrite.com.

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Karlee, Brittney, and Molly wear the dresses from their wedding day. Shoot location: Propcellar. All photos by Sophorn Kuoy.