In search of a NOLA floral rockstar

November 18, 2009 3:02 PM

Do you have any recommendations for an awesome (but not crazy expensive) florist in New Orleans? We're getting married there in April 2010 and planning the wedding from San Francisco, so it's hard to know where to start.

This is the second installment of Beg Askme for Help with Our NOLA Wedding. The first was regarding the venue; we ended up choosing the Dauphine Orleans. Now I'm thinking about flowers. It's a small wedding (28 people) with a small wedding party. It's going to be held in a really pretty outdoor courtyard, so we won't need just heaps of flowers for decoration.

Our tastes in floral design (there's a phrase I never thought I'd write) are sort of contemporary and nontraditional. I want my bouquet to be orange, for example. Our budget is smallish but reasonable for the size of the affair. Any suggestions for a rockstar florist?

posted by mostlymartha to shopping (4 comments total)

I work for a florist (unfortunately not in NOLA) but just wanted to pipe up that orange roses exist and would rock in that bouquet...as for locating a good local florist one suggestion is to ask YOUR local florist who they like to use when they wire flowers to the area. At the very least I bet they'd give you tips as to who to avoid!
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 3:22 PM on November 18, 2009

I can't recommend a NOLA rockstar florist, but I do have a rec for a rockstar photographer. Let me know if you are interested.
posted by sulaine at 3:57 PM on November 18, 2009

I've never used them before, and I can't speak to their pricing, but it looks to me like Harkins, The Florist does some solid wedding work. I'm a former florist with finicky tastes, and if I had to choose a florist in New Orleans, sight unseen, I'd be willing to give them a shot.

In my experience, the really good local florists can be hard to find on the internet because they often rely on word-of-mouth advertising and don't necessarily have a web presence. I'll usually skip right over any florist with a generic Teleflora, FTD, etc. website. That's not to say that none of them do good work, but the really good ones tend to be a little more image conscious. Some good search terms are "European garden," "high style," and "contemporary" but even with that there are usually an awful lot of results to search through because everybody is vying for the same business, and the generic florist website providers make sure all the search terms are covered. Another technique I've used for finding an exceptional florist in a city I'm not familiar with is searching the internet for local newspapers and magazines that publish annual "Best of" lists, and have a category for florists.

Hopefully some of that will be helpful. The Dauphine Orleans would probably be able to make some good recommendations too.
posted by Balonious Assault at 4:05 PM on November 18, 2009

Sulaine, yes please! That was going to be a future question. I memailed you.
posted by mostlymartha at 4:05 PM on November 18, 2009