02 Jan 2024

A Look Back at 2023

Photo by Emily Brown Photography

A Look Back at 2023!

Firstly let me just say a huge HAPPY NEW YEAR, and and enormous thank you to everyone who supported our business last year. Whether you worked with us, bought from us, or just liked one of our instagram posts, we appreciate all your support in making last year truly amazing for us! 

We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, and are now feeling rejuvinated and ready for the year ahead. Before we dive head first into all we have planned for the next year, we wanted to take a quick look back at 2023- because it was quite the wild ride!

The Boss Got Hitched!

How could I writea blog about 2023 without starting with the biggest event of the year (maybe even decade??)

Back in April of 2023, we celebrated Sharons wedding to her wonderful husband Nick, who some of you may have met during busy times when he lends a hand on deliveries. 

It was the most amazing day, filled with lots of laughter, heaps of dancing and TONS of flowers! 

To see more images of this amazing day, as well as a sneak peak into the designing process, and all the incredible suppliers involved- head to our inspirations page here: Sharon & Nick's Wedding

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New Website Launch

Over the past few years, our business has been growing and flourishing. With business blooming (pun intended), our old website wasn't reflecting how we saw ourselves. We needed more than a little face lift, so the team at Studio 44 worked tirelessley with us to create an amazing (and rather ambitious) website that we are now so proud of. 

While we were researching and brainstorming what we wanted from our website, we realised that in order to show off everything we do, our website needed to be BIG. We are hugely proud to be thriving in 4 very different categories of floristry: Weddings, Gift, Funerals and Corporate. Each part of our business needed its own website rescources and needed to be very user friendly. 

The wedding part of our website was especially ambitious, as we wanted to show off our work in ways that potential couples could really have fun with. Being able to look at real weddings, with inside tips, flower lists, colour schemes and supplier reccomendations has been extremely popular. The most exciting part for us was having the tools to filter these weddings by season, colour scheme and style. Check it out here: https://www.flowersatcolonnade.co.uk/inspirations/

We also wanted subscription flowers to be an easier and more streamlined option. Customers can now buy a rolling subscription for themselves or as a gift, and cancel anytime. We will even send the first month with a free vase! https://www.flowersatcolonnade.co.uk/subscription-flowers/

This was a huge project, and we are so happy with the results- we hope you love our new website as much as we do! 

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An Amazing Wedding Season!

2023 utterly blew us away wedding wise. Anyone in the wedding industry will tell you that the summer months are simply wild. We worked our socks off, built new relationships with fantastic suppliers, learned new skills and had an absolute blast doing what we love. By the end of the Summer we were completely exhausted, but it somehow still went by too fast! It's only really now that Christmas is over and we have a minute to breathe, that Sharon and I have a chance to reflect and appreciate the work we did last year. I'm hugely proud of the weddings we created in 2023 and I'm so excited to begin working with my 2024 couples.   

Photo by Poppy Maltby Photography. See more here : Laura & Tom

Photo by Shelby Ellis Photography. See more here: Laura & George

Photo by Shelby Ellis Photography. See more here: Lauren & Nick

Photo by Danni Beach Photography. See more here: Holly and Ian

Photo by Helen England Photography 

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Double Wedding Award Winners!!

We went into the final part of 2023 on such a high, after winning 'Wedding Florist of the Year' in not one, but two awards: The Kent Wedding Awards and The Wedding Industry Awards (Southeast)! 

This was a huge achievement for us and we couldn't be more proud and honoured. Having taking the Southeast title for The Wedding Industry Awards, we are now into the National finals in London at the end of this month- wish us luck!

Read more about these awards and the fantastic ceremonies on our awards page here: https://www.flowersatcolonnade.co.uk/awards-press/

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Festive Workshops

Our wreath making workshops were back by popular demand again in 2023! We hosted two amazing sold out events this year; one at the wonderful Black Horse pub on Camden Road, and the other at the delightful Eridge Village Hall.

We had so much fun teaching some familiar faces, as well as new ones. It amazes me every year that we can teach you all the same way, give you all the same materials and each ad every wreath will be completely unique (and all gorgeous!) Huge well done to everyone who joined us!

We have plans in 2024 for more workshops throughout the year. If you are interested in trying you hand at floristry this year, keep an eye on our workshops page here Workshops or sign up to our newsletter for early ticket access!

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What's coming up in 2024?

Well, now that would be telling...

We have so many big plans for 2024 that we are SO excited to share with you all very soon! While we put the finishing touches on our plans we will keep quiet- but make sure you subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on social media to be the first in the know!

For now. all we will say is that 2023 was just the start, and big things are coming for Colonnade Florist! Thank you so much to everyone who has supported us so far, and allowed us to keep doing what we love!

Sharon & Charlie 

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