Why We Build With Silk — and How We Make It Look Nothing Like Silk
If you hear “silk wedding flowers” and immediately picture stiff petals, shiny leaves, and something that looks like it came straight out of a craft-store bin, we get it.
Not all faux florals are created equal.
At Burgundy Loft Florals, we work primarily with silk and high-quality faux flowers, but our goal has never been to make arrangements that simply look good for faux flowers. We want them to look like beautiful wedding flowers, period.
And a lot more goes into making that happen than most people realize.
It Starts With the Stems
One of the biggest differences between realistic faux florals and arrangements that immediately look artificial is the quality of the individual stems.
We’re picky.
When we source flowers for our wedding floral collection, we look closely at the petals, coloring, greenery, shape, texture, and even how the stem moves. Some flowers photograph beautifully online and look completely different when they arrive, so we’re constantly testing, comparing, and building our inventory around the stems that actually look and feel the most believable.
We also don't expect one supplier—or one type of flower—to create an entire arrangement.
Just like a fresh floral designer works with different varieties, textures, greenery, and bloom sizes, we mix stems from different sources to create something that feels layered and natural.
Because nature isn't perfectly matched.
And your wedding flowers shouldn't look like they came out of one identical box either.
The Secret Is in the Mechanics
Buying realistic flowers is only the beginning.
How the flowers are arranged makes an enormous difference.
One thing we focus on heavily is movement. Fresh flowers naturally bend, reach, fall, and grow in different directions. Faux flowers sometimes need a little encouragement to do the same.
We reshape stems, adjust petals and leaves, manipulate branches, and position blooms so they don't all sit at the exact same height or face the exact same direction.
We also pay attention to things like:
- Mixing different bloom sizes and stages
- Layering multiple types of greenery
- Creating movement instead of perfect symmetry
- Leaving intentional negative space
- Breaking up repetitive patterns
- Hiding mechanics, plastic stems, and connection points
- Using texture to keep arrangements from looking flat
- Choosing colors with natural variation instead of one perfectly matched shade
Sometimes that means an arrangement actually needs fewer flowers, not more.
One of the easiest ways for faux florals to start looking artificial is when every possible space is packed with another bloom. We would rather give a flower room to have its own shape and movement than fill every inch simply for the sake of making an arrangement look “full.”
We Design Them Like Flowers, Not Decorations
This is probably one of the biggest differences in the way we approach silk florals.
We don't want to treat the flowers like decorations that need to be evenly spaced around an arch or centerpiece.
We design with them.
That means thinking about balance, shape, movement, color, focal points, texture, and how your eye travels through an arrangement.
For some weddings, that might mean a romantic garden-inspired arrangement with soft movement and greenery spilling outward.
For another, it might mean something more sculptural with dramatic branches, intentional asymmetry, or large floral groupings.
The fact that the flowers are silk doesn't change the design principles behind them.
If anything, working with faux florals has made us even more intentional about those details because we can't rely on a naturally curved stem or perfectly imperfect fresh bloom to do the work for us.
We have to create that movement ourselves.
Why We Love Silk Wedding Flowers for Our Brides
There are also some really practical reasons we've chosen to specialize in silk wedding flowers and floral rentals.
You Know What Your Flowers Will Look Like
Fresh flowers can vary depending on season, availability, weather, shipping, and what growers have available that particular week.
With silk florals, we're able to design with the actual flowers that will be used for your wedding.
That means you aren't choosing a look based entirely on an inspiration photo and hoping the right flowers are available when your wedding arrives.
More Flexibility With Season
Peonies in the wrong season?
A very specific shade of flower?
A floral style that uses varieties that aren't easily available locally?
Silk gives us much more flexibility to create a design based on the overall look you're trying to achieve rather than being limited strictly by what's in season.
They Hold Up Throughout the Day
Utah weddings can include everything from summer heat to windy outdoor ceremonies and cold-weather celebrations.
Silk flowers don't wilt halfway through your ceremony or start looking tired before reception photos.
They can also be prepared ahead of time, which gives us more opportunity to adjust and refine the design before your wedding day.
Renting Can Make Larger Designs More Accessible
One of our favorite parts of working with silk florals is being able to offer rental options.
Large wedding installations can require a significant amount of product. With rentals, those flowers don't necessarily have to be purchased for a single event and then thrown away afterward.
That allows us to reuse pieces from our collection while creating a completely different design for each wedding.
For brides, it can make statement pieces like floral arches, aisle flowers, centerpieces, and other larger installations more accessible without requiring them to purchase hundreds of individual stems themselves.
But Can You Tell They're Faux?
Sometimes.
And we think that's an important thing to say.
There are beautiful faux flowers, and there are not-so-beautiful faux flowers. There are also design choices that can make even an expensive silk flower look artificial.
Our goal isn't to pretend the flowers are something they're not.
Our goal is to choose quality materials and use the right techniques so that when you walk into your ceremony, look through your wedding gallery, or see your reception fully styled, you're paying attention to how beautiful the flowers are—not wondering whether they're fresh or faux.
Because when silk florals are thoughtfully sourced and intentionally designed, they can be incredibly beautiful.
And that's exactly why we build with them.
Looking for Silk Wedding Flower Rentals in Utah?
Burgundy Loft Florals creates realistic silk wedding florals and floral rentals for weddings throughout Utah County and Salt Lake County.
From bridal flowers and centerpieces to aisle arrangements and statement floral installations, our designs are created to feel romantic, dimensional, and intentional—without looking like traditional artificial flowers.
If you're planning your wedding and want to see what we can create for your space, explore our floral collections or contact us to start designing your wedding flowers.