Is it really that much cheaper to do silk flowers rather than real for a wedding?

I want something inexpensive, but I want the look of real flowers also.

Is it really that much cheaper to do silk flowers rather than real for a wedding?
It all depends on where you buy them and how you do it, I am going with all fake I started buying them over a year early and yes it has been very cheap I am done with my flowers and I spent maybe $150 for everything, thats my bouquet, a throwing bouquet, a matron of honor and 2 bridesmaids bouquets, flower petals for the flower girl, corsages for our mothers, 9 boutineres for all the guys (including 2 ushers, 2 fathers, and 1 grandfather), plus small arrangements for 10-15 tables. The only real flowers I will still have to buy will be Easter Lillies for the church and they should be easy and not too expensive since I'm getting married on 03/31/2007 (the weekend before Easter).





A couple of suggestions on how to do this- I found a great flea market / dirt mall, that has a craft store area where I bought large bunches of really nice silk flowers for like $3 and took them apart, also I went to Jo Anne fabrics numerous times over a couple month span as they were marking the spring flowers down I got some of them at 50% off and then I got lucky and bought most of them for 75%. (which was between $1.50 and $2.50 a bunch)





I am using roses, hydrangeas, irises, narcisus, and gladiolas in all of the arrangements.
Reply:YOUR BEST BET IS SILK. I GOT MARRIED THE 15TH OF THIS MONTH AND I DID SILK. I WANTED REAL BUT CHOOSE SILK AFTER LOOKIN AT PRICES A REAL FLOWER BOUQUET WAS GOING TO COST APPROX $400.00 WHEN I DID A SILK ONE FOR ABOUT $25.00. ALSO THE HEAT KILLS REAL ONES SO QUICK WHEN SILK WILL ALWAYS BE BEAUTIFUL.
Reply:Go for the sales. I just bought all of my flowers for a total of $100.





Hobby Lobby and Michaels runs AMAZING sales. You just have to know what to look for.
Reply:yes
Reply:I got VERY lucky with my wedding flowers. I went to BOCES - which is a vocational/trade school, for highschool students. If you have anything like that, I'd highly recommend going to talk to them. The only hitch is that you have to get married during the school year. I took a picture of the bouquet that I wanted for myself to a florist to see how much it would cost. They told me that it would be $100-$125 just for my bouquet - never mind the rest of the bridal party, the boutonnieres, corsages or church flowers. So, I went to BOCES, where they teach classes in floral design. There's no overhead, no labor - you just have to pay cost for the flowers %26amp; the kids kill themselves to do a good job, as their grades depend upon their work. As a result of going to them instead of a florist, my bouqet was only $30 %26amp; the total cost for all of the flowers combined was under $350 %26amp; they were BEAUTIFUL! Of course, I got married 12 years ago, so I'm sure prices have changed somewhat. But, if you have the option, I definitely recommend you looking into it. Good luck!
Reply:Silk flowers are just like real ones - you can do them for almost any price. At a discount store or a dollar store you can get super cheap silk flowers, but they might not look too real. If you go with a grocery store florist they will be nice and also cheap. Really nice silk flowers that look real, tend to cost a bit more than cheap real flowers. Good luck!
Reply:o my goodness yes !! I am getting married in 2 weeks and it is silly how much just my bouquet and 2 bridesmaids and the boutineers and costing thank goodness I did all the rest of the flowers in silk !!
Reply:Check out Michaels http://www.michaels.com This time of year they are marking down the Spring and Summer florals and you could probably get a great deal!





Good luck!
Reply:The silk flowers look just a good as the real and yes they are quite a bit cheaper depending on what you are looking at. Go to the stores and see what you think. Do some research about it and see which you think is the better choice for your wedding.





Research will help you make this decision. It all depends on what you are looking for.
Reply:NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO fake ones witll cost just as much I tried....I ended up going with a florist, just make sure they write EVERY SINGLE DETAIL down so you don't have the problems I had.
Reply:One thing about silk they last forever...I used both, but the silks i bought looked real, no one knew. Try Micheals if you have one, they have some really nice ones. I went to a friends wearhouse who only sells to high end shops, i did get a great deal but its not open to the public. Look around for the silks and price them and the real ones. With the silk you can do months ahead of time, saves on paying a florist.
Reply:My friend just had a wedding and saved close to1000 bucks by using silk instead of real. She got her flowers from hobby lobby and people thought they were real. I would have thought so too, but I was with her when she bought them. If you know what flowers you want, consult a florist and get an estimate. Then find your flowers in silk and do the math.
Reply:I did the same thing as Armywife. We had gone to Wal-Mart and bought silk flowers for 6 bouquets it cost us about $45 - $50 dollars. They looked as real as could be. Nobody could tell they were fake. The real flowers we bought for the mothers and all the men were VERY expensive.
Reply:I guess that would depend on what your silk flowers look like and what you go with. I ordered 100 stems of fresh tulips from www.growingflowers.com for about $140. That's a great deal for tulips in July and that covered the shipping costs from Holland. I did the rest myself. I did mix in some silk flowers because I wanted stefanotis, but they were hard to deal with and very expensive. I bought those at garden ridge and inserted a pearl in the center then mixed it with the tulips. It was all pretty simple and I didnt spend a whole lot.
Reply:For my wedding, I went to walmart, and bought silk flowers, made all my bouquets for under 40 dollars. thats 4 boquets. Its a whole lot cheaper. We used real flowers for the men and family, and it was almost 300 dollars. and not a lot of flowers.
Reply:my friend the florist did my flowers and she used silk and she could make all the bouquets about 8 weeks before the wedding and ship them to me in a box...one less thing to worry about at the last minute
Reply:For some things. I did fake for arrangements for decorating but real for everything else. The bouquets and all of that were real but some of the decor on the tables and stuff were fake and it worked out really well.
Reply:No... I think if you get the silk flowers that look real and are actually pretty, you will probably end up paying maybe a little less than real ones, but not much. I only used the silk ones because I wanted to keep my bouquet.