What Flowers Mean – a Guide to Decoding Your Choice of Wedding Flower

Want to send a message to your wedding guests without saying a word at all? Then you can by selecting the right kind of flower for your wedding. Traditionally, flowers have been assigned a number of meanings from birth month flowers, to protected national state flowers and emotions as well.

If you want to convey the right emotion with your wedding flowers, you first need to know what they mean. For brides and grooms, ivy, orange blossom and white roses are have special meanings. Here is a list of what each means;

Roses, one of the most popular wedding flowers, have a variety of meanings with each color.

Red: Love, Passion, Respect

White: Purity, Innocence, Silence, Happy love (bridal)

Pink: Appreciation, Grace, Happiness

Yellow: Promise of a new beginning, Joy, Friendship

Yellow with
Orange
Tip: Falling in Love

Orange
: Enthusiasm, Desire

Red and White: Unity

Red and Yellow: Happiness

Peach: Appreciation

Lavender: Love at First Sight

Black: Death

Other popular wedding flowers also have a wide variety of meanings. Be careful when choosing your flower…it could have a bad luck meaning!

Aster: A symbol of love

Red Carnation: My heart aches for you

Pink Carnation: I’ll never forget you

Striped Carnation: Refusal

Yellow Carnation: You have disappointed me

Cattail: Peace and prosperity

Daffodil: Unrequited love, the sun is always shining when I’m with you

Daisy: Loyal love, innocence

Dandelion: Happiness, Faithfulness

Fern: Fascination, Magic

Gardenia: You’re lovely

Gloxinia: Love at first sight

Holly: Domestic happiness

White Heather: Protection

Iris: Wisdom and valor

Ivy: Wedded love, fidelity and friendship

Whit lily: Purity

Calla lily: Beauty

Magnolia: Nobility

Marigold: Cruelty, Grief

Oleander: Caution

Orange Blossom: Marriage, Eternal Love

Peony: Shame

Petunia: Anger

Poppy: Imagination

Primrose: I can’t live without you

Snapdragon: Deception

Sunflower: Adoration, pride

Spider Flower: Elope with me

Red Tulip: Declaration of love

Violet: Modesty

Water lily: Purity of heart

Wisteria: Welcome

Zinnia: Lasting Affection

While these meanings are simply guidelines, don’t worry if your favorite flower has a not so nice meaning. Chances are, most of your guests won’t even know the significance, but its always nice to know. Furthermore, the meaning of a flower may help to assist you in picking out your motif. For example, white roses and ivy are specifically wedding flowers and greenery in the traditional meaning, and combined with other elements that have meaning to you would make for a fabulous flora arrangement.

Furthermore, you can even add significance of your own to a certain flower if you wish. If your partner brought you a dozen lilies on your first date, then to you, that may be a symbol of love at first sight. Flowers can take on a meaning of their own to you and your partner if a loving and lasting memory is attached to them.

Even though it is fun to know the traditional meaning of flowers, don’t let this guideline deter you from using one of your favorites. Flowers mean what you make them mean on your special day.