DIY Pressed Flowers: Press your own Wedding Bouquet

1. What will you learn?: I am Daniela from press Coast studio, and this video is going to show you how to press your wedding bouquet. I'll take you through the full process. We start by talking about deconstructing the wedding bouquet. We move on to talking about prepping for pressing. And I'll show you the full pressing process, including how to check up on your press and when to do so. I'll demonstrate this process using two different bouquets so that you can see the pressing process for some common wedding flowers and foliage. I give out lots of handy tips along the way so that you have all the knowledge that you need to press your own wedding bouquet. I've been pressing flowers for over four years now, and it gives me so much joy to be able to preserve people's special flowers from this special day. In my time, I've pressed lots of varices and orchids. So I go into a lot of detail about pressing these two kinds of flowers, which are commonly found in wedding bouquets and can be quite tricky to press. To follow along at home, you will need a wooden flower press, some paper, some paper towel, some cardboard, and a pair of scissors. This is a great tutorial for anyone looking to press their own wedding bouquet or for anyone who just wants to learn more about pressing flowers. This tutorial has been created to work alongside my pressing guide, which can be purchased from my website at www dot pressed code dot store. If you're keen to learn more about pressing flowers or to follow my journey, you can follow me on Instagram at pressed underscore car. 2. Pressing Tutorial : So we're going to begin by deconstructing the wedding bouquet. So firstly, we're going to remove any ribbon or floral tape that's holding the bouquet together. So just grab a pair of scissors and keep these handy. Then we're going to begin separating all the pieces in the bouquet into piles. So initially I'm just separating all the pieces, keeping all the same pieces together. So I'll start with a pile of braces there, got some carnations. And just keep moving through the bouquet, placing all of the same pieces together. When I'm deconstructing the bouquet, I'm already starting to think about the different groups of pieces. So I'm starting to think about the pieces that I'll be pressing versus the pieces that will just be hanging and add drying versus the already preserved pieces that I don't have to do anything with. So you can already start to be thinking about these groupings when separating your wedding bouquet. But the main aim is just to keep all of the same pieces together in neat piles. Once you've finished deconstructing your bouquet and you have all of your pieces and piles. You can give your workspace a bit of a clear through any pedals or any foliage lying around at the pin, then you can grab the pieces in your preserved pile. So I just grabbed the preserved hydrangeas and move those to the side because there's nothing we have to do with those pieces. Now I'm beginning together the pieces that we'll be addressing. So the pieces that I'll be hanging upside down, this is three that will be pressing. So as you can see, I've got a pile of carnations and listen theist. And I'm just tying a ribbon around the stems of these pieces in order to hang them from some hooks and let them air dry for three to four weeks. At the preserved and air drying pieces out of the way. The remaining pieces left are those that need to be pressed. So the next step in this process is to begin prepping these for pressing. We're now going to begin pressing these pieces. So for this part of the process, you'll need cardboard, some paper, and of course you wouldn't fail press. Begin by placing a piece of cardboard down in the press and then grabbing a couple of pieces of paper. And these will act as a layer of absorption for all of the moisture in the fresh flowers. Next, grab a pair of scissors, and I'm going to start with this variety of anemone flower was first, because the only other flowers that will be going in this press, all kids and they hold a lot of moisture. So I like to keep them towards the top of the press to avoid any moisture from layers above seeping into the layer of all kids, whether it will already be a lot of moisture. So as you'll see, I'm cutting these flowers as close as I can to the base, removing the stem entirely. Once the flowers have been D stemmed, I'm placing them face down on the layer of paper in front of me and making sure that well spread out so that none of the petals are overlapping. If you have fresh flowers on a piece of paper overlapping and on top of each other, this will increase the chance of discoloration, mold and transparency. So always make sure your flat with a nicely spread out across the sheet of paper. Once that layer is completely full with flowers, we're going to grab another two pieces of paper, place those on top, and then add in a layer of cardboard. I have then grabbed another two sheets of paper to begin my next layer, pressing. In this next layer we're gonna be pressing organs. So as you can see, I've cut the awkward at its base so that it's separated from the stem of all goods. And now I'm going to remove the center of the augured. I'll cut this piece off and we won't press that. And then I'll cut the second piece in the middle of that looks like almost a butterfly shape. We will be pressing that separately to the main organ. So as you can see, I'm placing the augured face down on the sheet and placing that centerpiece that I've cut out right next to it, you'll notice that that centerpiece doesn't really flatten and the little arms may even snap off. This is perfectly fine. Just still press all of the pieces and we can reconstruct them later if your intention is to frame these pieces. So keep going with this process and remove all of the centers from the toolkits and press these two pieces separately. I like to keep a maximum of three to four or goods per layer because they do hold so much moisture and because we don't want any pieces overlapping. Here, I'm working with a larger press. If you are working with an A5 size press, I'd recommend sticking to maybe to orchids pellet. When you start a new layer, you will simply just add in two sheets of paper to cover up your kids. And then another piece of cardboard, two sheets of paper for your new layer and just kept pressing. Once you finish pressing all of your flowers in your press, you're going to finish with. A sheet of cardboard and grab the lid of the press, place this on top and press down as a family and as hard as you possibly can so that the presses as flat as possible. Then you'll grab your wing nuts while pressing down flat and begin to screw these on as tightly as you can. With your press Close. The final thing you're gonna do is label your press with the date that you should check up on it. The file group of pieces left from this bouquet of roses. So we're going to begin prepping versus if you want to press the roast leaves, just begin by removing these from the stems and placing them to one side. We're going to grab the braces and cut off the stems by cutting as close as you can to the base. You'll see I have to go in a few times to get rid of all of the foliage at the base of the voice and to get a nice flat surface. Then to flatten out that worries, which is going to reach inside. Pull it nice and flat and place it face down on a piece of cardboard. Keep going with this process until you've D stemmed all of the Roses. Summaries, these will have a tightly bound lot of petals sitting in the middle, like you can see here that prevent you from flattening that rose. What you'll do is just reach in and gently pull out that inner layer of petals that's stopping you from flattening the rows so that you can pull it nice and flat and place it face down. You have to work gently with roses. As you can see here. If you cut the rows too close to the base, I'll pull off too many petals, it will just disintegrate. So prepping the roses is a process of both d stemming and D budding the roses so that we can flatten them. I will show this process again and from a closer up angle when I demonstrate the deconstructing and prepping for pressing of the second bouquet. I'm now going to walk you through that same process of deconstructing and prepping for pressing with a different bouquets so that we can cover a range of different pieces. When it comes to pressing. Again, we begin by removing any ribbon or floral tape from the bouquet. Then we'll grab a pair of scissors or a secretary has to get started. Again, we're going to begin separating the pieces in the bouquet. I've pulled out the already preserved pieces here we have some preserved hydrangeas, and I'll pop these to the side because there's nothing we need to do with these pieces. You can store your pre preserved pieces such as preserved hydrangeas in a closed plastic box. With the preserved pieces out of the way. We're going to move on to the fresh pieces and then Pre-K. As you can see the organs from the spec kit, you have already been separated and I was standing in a balanced and the side. We'll continue separating the rest of the fresh pieces into pile to keeping all of the same pieces together. In this bouquet, we have some cotton daisies and Bernanke kilos, and we also have summarises. We have deconstructed up, okay, and we have all of our pieces organized into piles. We're going to begin prepping for pressing. As you can see, that beginning by D stemming all of the flowers were taking us it is, and cutting the heads of the flowers off from the stem as close as we can to the base. You'll see that I left the stems on the carnations because I'm going to be addressing these pieces rather than pressing. Here, I demonstrate the process of prepping and Bernanke kilos for pressing. You're going to take your scissors or secretaries and cut the bud in the middle of the flower right out so that you have a nice flat surface to work with. We're going to move on to prep the Balkans. This is a process of both d stemming and D budding the rockets. As you'll see, I'm cutting the old good off from the stem as close as I can to the base without jeopardizing the flower now going too deep but the whole kit, so we're going to remove this Innocentive piece and place it to the side as we went. That we then remove this little butterfly shaped piece which we will be pressing but separately to the main or good. You'll notice that these little pieces of very delicate and bright quite easily you saw on that previous Olga had already broken during stressful. Still press all of the pieces as we can fix this later. So for each, okay, and you're making two snips. You'll keep this butterfly shaped piece and you'll end up with two pieces from H. All good to press. Continue this D budding and D stemming process until all of your all kids are ready for pressing. Just before we move on, I'm just going to go in and show this D budding process for all kids in slow motion. We're going to go in and snip off this first piece as we won't be pressing that. We then go in a second time and snip off this additional centerpiece. And this is the piece that we will be pressing, lying next to, separately to the original located in the press. The final two groups with pieces left in this bouquet, daisies and frozen. So for the daisies, we're just going to D stem, cutting the daisy heads off from the stem as close as we can to the base. For the roses we're going to do stem and D, but you can see I'm going in and cutting off the stem of the rows. I have to go in a few times to get that base as flat as possible after D stemming. Then we will deep up the rows. I'll flatten out the rows here and you can see it, this is really tightly bound center coil of petals here. I'll gently pull those out so that I can see the center of the rose and create a nice flat surface to work with. I'll just pose the frame here so you can see that here's a comparison to perform gesture, D stemming and D budding process for all the roses. I'm just going to show you that process of D stemming and D budding the roses from a closer up angle. And a couple of more times. Here we are cutting the stem off the rows really close to the base. You can see how nice and flat I'm trying to get that base to become. Then flattening out that outer layer of petals that I can reach in and gently pull out that inner layer of petals that are clearly like that and covering the center of the rose. Now that we've taken a look at deconstructing and prepping for pressing for two different bouquets. We're going to take a look at the pressing process in more detail. As you can see, when I press, I worked with cardboard and paper. I like to start with foliage or greens at the bottom of my press because these pieces have the least amount of moisture in them. This means that layering up pieces on top of them isn't going to cause the pieces to mold or disintegrate if they absorb the moisture from the layers above. When you're pressing foliage greens, you don't have to be too fussy. Eat the leaves can overlap and they should be okay because there's not much moisture in these pieces. Just try to make sure that the full leaf is sitting on the sheet of paper so that nothing is hanging out with the press. And try to stick to the same kind of foliage on one sheet of paper. We then move on to another layer. As you can see, the layering process is one piece of cardboard followed by two sheets of paper. Now I'm pressing some Dell finance. You can see with DOE funny atoms that you compress them in a big clump on a stem like this. And you can also cut the individual flowers off the stem and press the flowers face down. You'll see the dolphin is being cut from the stems and pressed facedown. When you're pressing fresh flowers rather than foliage, makes sure once again that the flowers are evenly spread across the page and that they're not overlapping. Unlike foliage petals hold a lot of moisture and they will mold or stick together if they're overlapping on the sheet. Once your sheet of paper is full, we're going to continue with the layering process. So covering up your layout with two sheets of paper and then placing a sheet of cardboard down to move onto your next layer. This is the layering process inside the piece of cardboard, two pieces of paper, another two pieces of paper and a piece of cardboard. Sometimes I will add into sheets of paper towel if the piece I'm pressing has a lot of moisture and I need some extra absorption. If you are using paper towel, it's really important to remember to place the paper towel underneath the paper rather than on top of the paper so that your flowers aren't sitting on the paper towel. You always want your flowers sitting on the flat smooth paper versus the paper towel. Because the patent on the paper towel can imprint on the petals of the flowers. I generally advise trying to stick to the same piece on one sheet of paper. So the same kind of flower. However, if you have some extra space leftover in a sheet and you have other pieces with a similar level of moisture to those that you are already pressing. You can add these in on the same sheet. The great thing about these wooden presses is that you can press so many layers. For my final couple of layers in this press, I've got a good mix of flowers on one sheet. However, they all have similar levels of moisture, so they will be fine together. After closing up that first press, I'm going to start on a second press to demonstrate the pressing off some orchids. As you can see, we're starting with a piece of cardboard. Again. However, this time we are adding into sheets of paper towel. This is because all kids have a very high level of moisture and the paper towel just offers an extra layer of absorption. As I mentioned before, just make sure that the final layer that two pieces are resting on is paper and not paper towel. Here the layering processes one sheet of cardboard, two sheets of paper towel, and two sheets of paper. Repeat this process to close off that layer. You'll see that I'm pressing quite a few orchids on one sheet of paper. However, this is a legit press. If you're working with an A5 press, I do recommend limiting it. Two to three organs pillow. As I move up through the press, you'll see that I start adding in that centerpiece from the old kit that we cut off earlier. Once everything is in the press, just close your press up as shown before. The final part of this process is checking on your press. With pressing, you have to go in and check that the paper, paper, towel, and cardboard hasn't gathered too much moisture. To check on your press, you simply move from top to bottom through the layers. Checking on each of the pieces. You'll see that the pieces he had definitely aren't dry yet. They're still quite fluffy and there's lots of moisture on that paper. I'm going to move these to the side, place down fresh cardboard and fresh paper towel, and transfer the pieces onto this dry paper. I'll close up this layer, place it at the bottom of the press, and move on to the next layer. As I move through the press, I am just transferring the pieces onto some clean, dry paper and replacing any damp cardboard. Lots of the fresh flowers that you'll be checking up on and like those in this press, a very delicate, these definitions will disintegrate if you pick them up to roughly. So you'll see I'm gently flicking them off the paper to transfer them onto the clean paper. Once I'm finished checking the press, I'll simply place the lid back on, press down and close it up and I'll label it with a new date for checking to go back and check the paper again. With that second press that just had all kids in it, alpha, this exact same process, except I'll obviously also be swapping out the paper towel in this press. I'll simply move through the layers with the old kids and they send two pieces and transfer these pieces onto the clean, dry paper, paper, towel, and cardboard. You'll notice that the orchid stick to the paper quite a lot. So it's quite important to peel these off gently, avoiding ripping from the center or the separate petals of the old code will begin to disintegrate. With all goods. It's really important to check them regularly as they have so much moisture that the paper dampens quickly. I recommend checking on all kids every two days for the first couple of weeks of pressing. And towards the end, you could check them once a week as the moisture levels have a lessened inside the flowers. Finally, we'll close the second press up and label it with a new date to check. Now, I'm just going to reshape that process for pressing or kids from a different angle so that you can really see the layering process inside the press. The amount of time that you leave your flowers and foliage inside the press is going to vary depending on what you're pressing. As a general rule, foliage will be ready in one to two weeks, whereas your fresh flowers could take anywhere up to eight weeks depending on how much moisture they have in them. This is particularly true for pieces like orchids. You'll know that your piece is fully dry when you check the press and it feels like paper and it has a certain stiffness to it that you could almost fold it in half. Remember to store your press and a dry cool room and set yourself reminders so that you don't forget to check up on it. When all your pieces are dried and ready to store them in a closed plastic container to make sure that no bugs or insects can get inside. 3. We hope you had fun!: You should now have a good base level of knowledge to get started on pressing your own wedding bouquet. If you're looking for more guidance and want more details on each of the steps involved in the pressing process. You can purchase my pressing guide from my website at www dot press code dot store. You can also find me on Instagram at, at pressed undisclosed car and have a look at all the wedding bouquets I've pressed, preserved and frightened. I hope you've learned a lot and that you'll have fun with this process and with this new skill. Thank you so much for joining my class.