www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Crowns for Crowning

Seeing as how, by God's grace, I have 2 sons marrying in a few months, we are in search of directions for making the crowns---both couples want to use floral/leaf crowns (instead of the metal variety whcih our little mission doesn't have anyway ) but none of us has any idea how to go about making the crowns. Can any of you point us in the right direction for instructions?
Blessings all,
Alice

Search your neighborhood and see if anyone has perwinkle as a ground cover. Periwinkle is what the Eastern Slavs use by tradition as it is a sign of fertility. My Baba's yard has perwinkle as a ground cover on the side of the house that does not get much sunlight (and grass is almost impossible to grow). We use to mistake it for Violets as it produces a violet-colored flower every Spring. If you can't find any in your neighborhood, I'm sure most florsl shops can get perwinkle to use as Crowing material.

Ungcsertezs ("Crown them in glory O Lord")

[It's running in my mind that there was a thread about this not too long ago and Fr Deacon Diak was involved .

Mebbe is we keep bumping this it will catch his eye

Part of the question, I guess, is what does one use as a foundation for the crowns? I understand it shoud be somewhat flexible (not like a heavy advent wreath)...and how do you attatch the foliage to the base? One son wants to use myrtle..
blessings
Alice

Alice,

I suggest the couples consult with a local florist. The florist has no doubt made crowns for others. Just have the couples make a list of the type of floral and foilage they would like.

There is always the idea of purchasing Greek-style crowns avaible from Annula Designs [annuladesigns.com] which appears to be in your neck of the woods. Floral arrangements could be added to these and then the couples could keep the crowns as an heirloom.

Alice and all,
That web site has some pretty neat looking crowns. Also, one of the couples has been offered the loan of metal crowns from a local parish here with the suggestion(by Fr Anthony) that they could incorporate plant materials in the crown. Not sure how that idea has been received ! It would be cool if they had something, like a floral or myrtle crown, which they could preserve and keep in their homes afterwards, whether or not they use metal crowns. If I happen to see son #2 today I will direct him to this thread.
Blessings
Michele

Cool web-site.their address is actually about 3 hours from us... and here in town I doubt that any florist has made wedding crowns...but this is certainly a help. I'm sure in the end it will all be perfect,whatever they do.
The pictures have certainly gottenb the wheels turning in my mind!
Thanks so much!
Thanks Michele for touching bases with Matt!
Blessings
Alice

In case ya'll hadn't noticed we're all related :-)(or soon to be anyway).
I liked the crowns that Fr Anthony offered us, but I do really wanted to keep-or at least part of-the crowns we use.
Alice,
it could be that there are some florists in SF in the Russian district that have made crowns before. That's something we could look into.
Also, the myrtle that grows around here(ok in Ukiah) has really long leaves that don't lend themselves to making attractive crowns. I had started messing around with some of it and I figured out how to make the base but couldn't get the leaves to look right...
I had never heard of using periwinkle, I had heard from several souces that myrtle is what is traditionally used by Ukranians. Periwinkle would be nice if we could get our hands on some-at least to use in addition to whatever else.
Blessings and prayers,
Sarah

Sarah

PM Fr Deacon Randy [ Diak] I'm sure he mentioned that his wife had made them in the past .

Yeah there was a post not all that long ago that son #2 (me) posted asking about how to make them. The link is

https://www.byzcath.org/cgibin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=3;t=000423

One of these days when I am done with school for the quarter and have some free time (don't laugh) or I just run out of time, I want to talk to some florists about making the wedding crowns.

The Pacific Wax Myrtle that I want to use, as Sarah said, has longer leaves than another couples wedding crowns we saw, so it would be hard to make it look nice. What I was thinking of doing was using the stem as the "foundation" and then wrapping something (such as a ribbon that woudl blend in) around the stems and the petiols (the leaf's stem) so the leaves wouldn't flop around as much. Obviously it will need some experimentation. I don't have access to the myrtle to play with it here at school (or too take it to a florist) so it'll have to wait a month when I am back home and out in the woods.

The other option that I have been thinking about was using something else. I will have to find some periwinkle! I'm honestly not sure what its like but since its been used before, it will almost certainly be more suitable than the pacific wax myrtle! Is it vine like and how big are that leaves?

What I really wanted to do was get some of the California bay's flowers for Sarah's crown cause its local and would look really cool. But it stopped flowering about a month ago, so thats not really an option.. Thanks all!

Matt

I love this family conversation here

Does anyone know if we could grow periwinkle between now and June 11th?

Contact St John's Orthodox Greek Catholic Church in Ambridge, PA. They have it growing along the outside of their parish!

Ungcsertezs

Aha! Just as I suspected-periwinkle is vinca minor! That grows everywhere around here.
Michele