Editorial Reviews:
Book Description
One of the most anticipated experiences in every bride-to-be’s wedding planning is choosing her bouquet. However, when faced with the real-life sea of styles and flowers, a bride-to-be may soon become overwhelmed. To Have & To Hold offers more than 150 unique bouquets, pictured in 200 luminous photographs, that incorporate scores of seasonal flowers both familiar and exotic, as well as flowering branches, pinecones, leaves, feathers, family lace—even fruits and herbs—to guide her in her decision.
David Stark and Avi Adler escort the bride-to-be through today’s maze of flowers and bouquet styles, identifying the indispensable basics: Labels and deconstructed bouquets name every flower. Lists of flowers available by season and by price help narrow the choices based on when the wedding will take place and what the budget is. Also included are practical details such as how to care for flowers, how to make your own stunning and cost-effective bouquet, how to hold the bouquet and then how to preserve it, and how to tie in boutonnieres, bridesmaids’ bouquets, and flower girls’ baskets. In addition, the authors’ personal anecdotes offer sage advice on bouquet do’s and don’ts.
To Have & To Hold has a bouquet to strike any fancy for every kind of wedding day.
Customer Reviews:
Review #1: Breathtaking Floral Designs- Thank you David Stark!!
2006-07-27 
David Stark has done a wonderful job of giving us fabulous ideas and inspiration for couture floral. I appreciate this book because many times brides can't afford full-blown high-style floral designs, but she still appreciates the very best. This presents the very best to everyone. Thanks, David!
Review #2: a-m-a-z-i-n-g
2006-06-08 
THIS WAS A TRULY AMAZING AND HELPFUL BOOK THAT GUIDED ME TO MAKE THE BEST FLORAL DECISIONS FOR THE WEDDING THAT I ALWAYS DREAMED FOR.
Review #3: FABULOUS BOOK
2006-06-08
"WOW!" Is all I can say. Finally a truly inspiring and helpful road map through the sea of floral choices. It was the perfect resource to show my florist what I truly love and want for my wedding. Thank you!
Review #4: beautiful and inspiring
2006-06-06
[...] To Have and To Hold is undoubtedly one of the most elegant, information packed, stunning books on the subject that I have ever seen -- filled with photo after photo of lusciousness. There are probably over 200 amazing photos in this book, and I highly recommend it both for the bride to be and simply the flower lover. It has provided me with so much inspiration and information -- what flowers are available when, what flowers are beautiful to pair with others, what color combinations are gorgeous, and what the reality of my choices or floral dreams might have on my wallet -- this book is a MUST have. I can't find any others that even come close to the ground that this one covers with such sophistication!
Review #5: Nice designs, but overall not as many bouquet photos as expected...
2006-06-02 
I recently purchased this book (and another bridal bouquet book that hasn't received as much p.r. as this book). My expectations of this book were high because of all the promotion in bridal magazines, however, I was disappointed to discover there aren't as many bouquet photos in the book as expected. The photography is good and the floral designs pictured are very contemporary, but I found there to be a lot of white space and a lot of filler photos (distance or silhouette photos of brides, up close photos of cut flowers, ribbon with scissors, etc) used. The text subject matter is very light (not detailed "how to" instructions) and varies in topic though generally explaining a little about some of the types of flowers used (for example, "Leucojum is known informally as the summer snowflake..."). Of 208 pages, this book contains, approx. 80 (yes, I counted) large and medium size photos of bouquets, approx. 30 small photos of bouquets, a couple of bouts, a couple of hair wreaths, etc, and approx. 78 of what I felt were more filler photos (as I described above). This book provides a good glimpse of the authors' style of design, but I found the content, number of photos, and types of photos to be very similar to many other books on the market.
Because I own nearly 40 floral design books that are similar to this one, I was searching for a more comprehensive, bouquet photo reference book that brides can use as a "one stop shop" for choosing styles and colors they like. I did find that in the other book I purchased (The Bridal Bouquet Book by Ginny Parfitt, Schiffer Books). It's is a gem of a find, and I'd recommend it, instead, to brides and florists looking for one, primary reference book filled with wedding bouquet photos. It has 176 pages with 351 (yes, I counted) large and small photos of bouquets, 71 photos of bouts, corsages, etc., 0 filler photos, and it's currently my top pick for wedding floral books. The designs are contemporary and appear to be created by many different floral designers so the book offers a wide variety of creative styles. |
