Preserving Your Wedding Bouquet in Resin
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Nothing will cue the post-wedding blues more than watching your gorgeous, fragrant blooms slowly wilt and die in the weeks following your wedding. Don’t let this happen to you! There are so many ways to preserve that vibrant bouquet of yours, but one of the coolest ways (in our opinion) is preserving your wedding bouquet in resin. This incredible preserving technique creates a durable, unique and even practical piece of art that will allow you to cherish your wedding bouquet for years to come.
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Durable
Resin is known for being a strong, durable material. The glossy, clear solid plastic is created mixing epoxy resin with hardener, thus creating a chemical reaction. Many artists, crafters, and DIYer’s use resin for various projects, including jewelry, décor, and even furniture. You’ll surely be able to enjoy your wedding bouquet for years by preserving it in this long-lasting material.
Unique
Preserving wedding bouquets in resin has gained popularity over the last couple of years, but it’s still a relatively new art form. PLUS, you can preserve the bouquet in virtually any shape: Square, hexagon, sphere…even letters! The options are endless, which adds to its uniqueness. Not only will your unique piece of art ‘wow’ guests at your home, you will also get to tell them the cool story behind it!
Practical
In additional to the beautiful, block display pieces, you can also create practical items that you will use daily! A few examples are coasters, bookends, and wine sealers. Our favorite? A ring holder!
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The Process
Although there are a number of techniques, preserving your bouquet in resin generally begins with drying the flowers for two to three weeks. Once the flowers are properly dried, you arrange the flowers in the mold. Next, you pour multiple layers of resin into the mold, with roughly 24 hours of drying time between each layer, until the flowers are fully covered. The final step is letting the piece dry and cure. In general, the entire process takes six to eight weeks.
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How to Prepare
Our best advice is to have a plan laid out BEFORE your wedding day. If you’re going to preserve your bouquet yourself, make sure you have all the necessary materials. You might even want to practice. If you’re not the crafty type, the first place to ask is your florist, as they might have flower-preserving services. If they don’t preserve flowers, they may be able to point you in the right direction.
You can also head to Google to find businesses that have mastered the process. If you can’t find a local business to preserve your flowers, there are many businesses around the nation that you can ship your flowers to.
Our final tip: it’s best to get your flowers into the hands of the professionals as soon as you can. At the end of your wedding, give your flowers to your maid of honor, mom, aunt, grandma, etc. and ask them to either deliver or ship your flowers to your desired location so you don’t have to worry about it.
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So what do you think? Will you be preserving your wedding bouquet in resin after your special day? Click HERE for more ideas on what to do with your wedding bouquet after your wedding.
A special thanks to dbandrea for providing the photos in this post!
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