In this episode of the Engage wedding‑planning podcast, host Jamie Wolfer answers listener questions about using faux (fake) flowers, timing and storage of wedding décor, and color‑palette ideas for a brick‑and‑wood venue. Jamie explains that high‑quality faux florals can be as expensive as real stems, so renting (e.g., from A Floral) is often the most cost‑effective route, while Hobby Lobby offers affordable, realistic greenery. She outlines DIY considerations, budgeting tips, and the importance of aligning décor purchases with storage space and a firm visual vision. For a venue with brick and wood, Jamie suggests two main color strategies: a monochromatic white‑and‑green scheme with café‑au‑lait accents, or a jewel‑tone palette (emerald, amethyst, burgundy) that complements the warm tones of the venue. Throughout, she promotes her Master Plan course and related resources for deeper planning support.
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Well, hello, lovely humans, and welcome to Engage, a wedding planning podcast for the modern-day couple. I'm your host, Jamie Wolfer, and I truly believe that wedding planning does not need to be complicated or time-consuming. I kind of picture these episodes like jumping on a quick phone call with your wedding planner. You get your answers and you go on your merry way, because sometimes not all of us have an hour to dedicate to listening to super long podcasts or super long intros. So without further ado, let's just jump right on into it. Today's episode is going to admittedly be a little bit all over the place. You see, every single month I sit down with the people over in the Master Plan course and answer your questions in lifetime. So if you find yourself struggling and really need to sit down and speak with a real-life wedding planner, I would love to be a part of your wedding planning journey. Join us over in the Master Plan today to get your questions answered. Until then, take a listen. After getting a floral quote, I'm thinking of DIYing my own florals with fake flowers. We're aiming for an enchanted forest. What is with everyone and these incredible themes? Kathleen, We're already planning to do greenery instead of florals on the tables, so I'd only be DIYing bouquets and possibly some florals to go on the existing arch for the ceremony. Any recommendations on fake florals assembly, recs on the best places to buy, things to watch out for, etc.? Um, I know fake are so not preferred, but I feel like the fake florals have come a long way, and I just can't justify the big spend on bouquets that will hardly be used for more than an hour total. I'm a pretty crafty person and have 10 months to get everything prepped and ready. I just don't want these to come out looking incredibly fake or cheap and would love any tips. Okay, so there is a video that I did about faux florals. Okay, first of all, if you want to do faux florals, I love that journey for you and I fully support it. Are they my favorite? No. Am I going to be convinced otherwise? Probably not. However, I do know that a lot of people really do value them. There is a myth about faux florals being less expensive. If you are getting the ones that look really nice. The best thing that you can do in a situation like this would be to rent your faux florals, because there is a direct— I was gonna say correlation, but like, the more real a faux floral looks, the more expensive it is. And it actually costs more per stem than its real counterpart. If you are okay with them looking a little bit more fake, or definitely looking fake, or, you know, that's when the cost will come down and they might be comparable. To a real one, or they might be cheaper. My favorite places to look for faux florals would be A Floral. I love a lot of what they do. Um, I did do a full review of a bunch of different kind of faux florals. The team, the team was like, we're gonna find some that Jamie actually likes, and they did find a single bouquet, but it was already pre-done. Um, and then we do have a couple other ones for if you want to DIY your actual florals. So because you're in a situation where You have time, I would consider a floral, but it's going to be spendy. Hobby Lobby, um, some people love them, some people hate them. I think they have the most genuine looking greenery from anyone I've ever seen in person. Um, so that might be a really good place to look for that. In fact, I have quite a bit of the faux greenery from Hobby Lobby around the house, um, because it looks like real plants and they sit in places that are too dark for real plants. I wonder if I have any other tips for you. Um, I don't know enough about lings to speak to them, but I feel like the best bet for you, if we're trying to be super affordable about it and we want to go faux, the most affordable thing that you would do and still have a nicer look would be rentals. Um, or you're going to spend more on florals, which you honestly might not mind. You'd be like, listen, I'll spend $200 putting my bouquet and a couple other things together, I don't care. But then at least it's permanent. I get to hold on to it. If that's the case, great. That makes me really excited. I would do A Floral and Hobby Lobby. There's got to be another place that has really good faux florals. Let me think about it and I'll see if I can get back to you before, before we wrap up for today. Sitting here listening to a podcast is all fine and dandy, right? But sometimes you need an actual person to be asking some of these questions to. And you may be sitting there going, you know what, Jamie, actually, yeah, that, that makes a lot of sense. I would love to be able to ask you these questions. Guess what? You need to join the Master Plan. You've heard me talk about it, but do you know why I love it so much? You get over 10 lessons that walk you through planning your wedding with videos and spreadsheets and other detailed resources along the way. Join me and my virtual clients over in the Master Plan and get all your wedding planning questions answered. Literally thousands of couples have gone on this journey with me, and I'd love for you to be next. Check it out at wolferandco.com TMP. That's wolferandco.com TMP. Listen, wedding budgets suck. They're just like the actual worst. And the hardest part for me is that weddings are not cookie cutter. They're not one size fits all. And I think it's important to make sure that you're budgeting according to your priorities. Build a budget that works with your vision and you'll be on the path to planning a wedding that you really want. So if you want my recommendations for making your perfect budget for you and your partner, head on over to weddingpriorities.com. Okay, when should I start getting my decor items? I don't want to get things too early in case my style preference changes. Style preferences change. Morgan, that's a fantastic question. Uh, also storage. Like, it sounds like a really good idea, but if you live in a one-bedroom apartment or if you're living with your parents, you guys are living together regardless. Like, you, you have a limited amount of space. So it depends on what you're getting, how well it incorporates into your home. Like, obviously we're talking earlier, um, who— it was Nally that I was talking to— if you're buying stuff that can go into your house, well then it just blends in seamlessly. But if we're talking about DIYing and buying 100 glass, like fluted champagne glasses, those are a lot more difficult to store. So I would say, first of all, how much storage you have and how much of it needs to be stored in boxes, needs to be put away. And I don't think— I think if you're within the year, most people's design doesn't change drastically in a 12-month period. I would say as long as you feel pretty solid about your Pinterest board and you have the space for it, you're fine to start picking up items now. If you don't have the space, you're kind of wishy-washy, you should probably wait. I wouldn't buy anything out of that 12-month window though, unless you're like, this is my vision. I've known since I was 4 and a half, nothing can change my mind. Then yeah, I support you. But if you're still kind of like, especially if you're asking, cause your style preference might change, that might mean that your window is long enough that you're looking at like, I don't know, 18 months or longer. If you're not convinced on your vision, I would wait or keep the receipts. Carolyn said, we have the venue for our December 2025 wedding, lots of brick and wood. Ooh, delicious. Any advice for when you just can't seem to figure out what colors or decor you want? Nothing feels right. Okay, there's an old video called How to Style Your Wedding that I would think would be great. We also have a style guide and our entire Pinterest that could be pretty fun for you. What I see right now with brick and wood, uh, Look at those as colors. So we're probably seeing reds and oranges in those, right? A really good complement or contrast to that, if you look at the color wheel, um, could be blues, could be purples. Those might be a little strong. I actually really love white and green with brick and wood. So if you keep your colors for your florals pretty monochromatic, chef's kiss. Maybe throw in some of that café au lait that we were talking about earlier. Or some ivories or some different warmer white tones to kind of give you a little bit more variety and round out that look so it's not stark white and green. That could be really, really fun here. If you want, you could also go jewel tone because that way you're picking up on those really brilliant, you know, the reds from the brick and the oranges from the wood. And then we're getting the green, like that deep emerald, um, that deep purple, that amethyst. We can really play with some of those jewel tones as well. And there are a couple boards on our Pinterest that I think both would kind of work in either direction you want to go with that. Those would probably be my top 2 for those— for that color pattern. That doesn't mean you can't pick something else, but those are— those are the 2 that excite me the most when I'm thinking about a room like that. I'm like, I either want monochromatic or jewel tone and nothing in between. Oh, there was that one wedding that we did in the Mitten Building, uh, where she did— she brought in burgundies to the neutral tone. So it was like white, ivory, and then the greenery, and then burgundy. That was delicious. So it's almost like an amalgamation of those two, right, where we have the neutrals but that one pop of a really interesting color. I don't think— I probably wouldn't do like a pop of an orange, but I could see a burgundy being really pretty, or getting in some really pretty orangey yellows. That could work too if you kind of want to mix those two together. If you are struggling with wedding planning and you have questions and you just need someone to listen and to chat with, come join us in the Master Plan Community over at themasterplanwed.com. Com. I would love to have you in there. Thanks so much for listening. If you haven't done so already, subscribe, jump on over to wherever you're listening to this podcast and leave a 5-star review so we can let the podcast people know that Jamie knows what she's talking about sometimes. And until next time, bye guys!
