Greenery Tips: Choosing Colors!

We have all been there - the flowers are dyed and ready to get made into a pretty bouquet or arrangement and we know one greenery style that NEEDS to be included. Then comes that all too familiar question... 

What other greenery and/or fillers will work with what is in front of me?!

Using our new paper greenery as inspiration, let's chat about some basic tips that will point you in the right direction! 

Our New Paper Greenery Line-Up

How cute are these?! We've used them in bouquets (YouTube video coming soon!) and think they are perfect for items like wood rounds, box arrangements...the possibilities are endless!

Now onto the choosing greenery tips! First thing to mention, these are just guidelines for choosing greenery. If you are playing with combinations and something stands out as an amazing option, go for it! Rules were meant to be bended and sometimes broken!!

Blue-Toned Greenery

For the most part, greenery tends to have either blue or yellow undertones. Eucalyptus generally leans toward the blue, cool tones and this Multi-Toned Silver Dollar Eucalyptus is no exception! 

To pull out more of those blueish tones, I added seeded eucalyptus (the different shape of the leaves really provides a great addition to the mix), summer eucalyptus (which actually has blue tipped "seeds"), and Italian ruscus (to add an incredible texture to this group of greenery). 

Angel vine at the top center of the greenery wheel picture is a perfect, neutral green that can tie into just about any type of greenery color story!

You know how I mentioned these are just guidelines? Take a look at the flocked dusty miller in the bottom right of the picture on the left above. That actually has yellow undertones. BUT! You can see that it connects to the overall color palette in the picture. If you chose just the dusty miller with the multi toned silver dollar eucalyptus, they might clash. Since we have this spectrum of colors, however, there is a gradual blend of greenery colors (by adding in summer blooming mix and early blooming mix) that tie that piece into working with the first greenery selection we made.

Yellow-Toned Greenery

Greenery that skews to the yellow undertones (like this Israeli Ruscus) does so well with warm colors (think bright tropical themes, a warm sunset, traditional fall colors of bright red, orange and yellow, etc.).

Large ruscus, summer dreams mix, succulent mix and smilax also have yellow undertones and play so well off of the Israeli ruscus!

To help choose greenery for a project (and this works for any color story!), keep the theme of the project in mind and ask yourself "Does this fit the XYZ vibe?" If the answer is "Yes," add it to your maybe pile. If "no," save it for another day. Once the maybe pile is all together, pick it up, mix it around and if something doesn't seem to look quite right with the others, take it out of your selection!

Complementary/Contrasting Greenery

Our Paper Leaf - White Sage greenery is a stand out! It is this amazing light sage-y color with blue undertones and to help ensure it pops in any arrangement, the greenery I chose to pair with it does one of two things:

It either highly contrasts or perfectly complements the color.

The easiest way to find a contrasting color is to select something with a similar undertone (in this case blue) but go to the opposite end on the darkness scale! The three examples from the picture above are the seeded eucalyptus, the ficus (I only used the bottom layer of leaves as the tip of the ficus is lighter and has yellowish undertones), and the olive branch (which is two-toned and has both darker leaves and complementary ones).

For the complementary pieces which include early blooming mix, Italian ruscus and dusty miller, each of those have lighter tips that can bring out the beautiful color of the paper greenery.

Muted Greens/Natural Fillers

I love the boho look. And that is immediately what I thought of when this Bamboo Leaf came into the shop! 

It came naturally to pull the dried natural fillers (phalaris, bunny tails, scabiosa) and the preserved bleached fillers (willow eucalyptus and ruscus) but if you have ever worked with those pieces, they can take a little finagling to place in a bouquet or arrangement at the correct angle. That's why it is great to use some faux greenery/fillers that have the ability to bend to fill in any gaps! 

To select faux greenery that can complement those natural tones, I recommend something that has almost a brown undertone (like the sage greenery and bamboo leaf in the pic above). And to bring in a bit of contrast, the olive branch has that dark side on its leaves. Since those leaves are thinner, it is a pop of contrast to cut through the natural tones without that dark green overtaking the whole color vibe.

Keep Experimenting!

All in all, finding the best greenery and fillers to use together is up to you and your taste. You can follow the guidelines above or grab whatever is appealing to your eye. Don't be afraid to experiment as you can edit your piece along the way if something isn't working. Keep adjusting, changing, adding greenery until you have the look you want!