Decorations with Meaning - Choosing Flowers for Your Wedding Reception

If there was ever a day when sentiment should hold sway, your wedding day is the one. You plan meaning into everything, from the rings you choose to symbolize your love, to the vows you exchange, to the garter slipped beneath your gown. Why not extend that to the flowers you choose to decorate your reception hall?

If you choose your wedding reception flowers with an eye to the traditional floral meanings, your wedding reception decorations will not only be beautiful, they'll have a beautiful meaning that you can treasure.

Not sure what the various flowers mean? Try a few of these combinations chosen for their meanings and appearance in wedding centerpiece arrangements and wedding table or wall decorations.

Love, Joy and Fidelity

In the traditional language of flowers, pale pink and yellow roses represent joy. Baby's breath, with its tiny, feathery white flowers, means everlasting love, making it a natural for inclusion in wedding flowers, and ivy stands for fidelity.

For a romantic wedding reception centerpiece decoration, create a floral topiary tree topped with baby pink and pale yellow roses. Twine the wooden stem with ivy, and tuck sprigs of baby's breath in among the leaves to wish the bride and groom an everlasting love.

Luck, Love and Family

Add some extra meaning to an Asian themed wedding by including white orchids in the flower arrangements. The lovely, delicate flowers traditionally stand for many children, a blessing for the happy couple. Arrange several in a tall black vase with camellias for luck and orange blossoms for eternal love and enjoy the fact that even the flowers on your wedding tables contribute to the good wishes on your wedding day.

Loyal Love, Shelter and Confidence

If you've decided on wildflowers for a simple garden wedding, be sure to include daisies in the wedding table arrangements. They stand for loyal love, something every couple wishes for on their wedding day. Tuck them into an arrangement of fresh, feathery ferns to represent the shelter of the happy couple's love, and the confidence they have in each other.

Success, Wealth and a Happy Marriage

For dramatic wedding table decorations that add special meaning to your wedding reception flowers, combine red peonies with yellow poppies and tiger lilies. The vibrantly colored blossoms are the perfect contrast against a waterfall of gleaming green ivy, the traditional symbol of a happy marriage.

Perseverance, Joy and Wedded Bliss

A lovely arrangement for a Southern plantation wedding could combine magnolias, gardenias and lily-of-the-valley for graceful centerpieces with antebellum charm. An added bonus is that your reception decorations will smell as sweet as they look.

Other Symbolic Flower Decoration For A Wedding

Besides the wedding reception centerpiece flowers, here's a handful of decorating ideas that incorporate flowers with special meanings:

Wrap napkins with ribbon rings, and tuck a single pink rosebud with a sprig of baby's breath into each ribbon. The message is everlasting love.

Top your wedding cake with a spray of white orchids and ivy to symbolize fidelity and perfect love.

Twine ivy and white roses around pillars or archways to represent fidelity and wedded bliss.

About the Author

Abe Gardea is a full-time freelance writer.