The idyllic picture of a young girl walking happily up the aisle while tossing fresh rose petals here, there, and everywhere, is a common wedding ceremony vision. Whether you choose to encorporate it into your own ceremony is a matter of personal preference, but even if you don’t have a flower girl, dried rose petals, if done properly, can be a fragrant and beautiful accent at both the ceremony and the reception in the form of centerpiece accents, potpourri, and surrounding the head table.
While the current rage in flower preservation is the potentially costly freeze drying method, rose petals that you don’t intend to keep need not be subjected to this special treatment. Couples can save their floral budget by only freeze drying important pieces, such as the bridal bouquet and the groom’s boutonniere, and turning to easy methods of petal drying that can be done in a home kitchen.
In the months leading up to your wedding, scope out local florists for rose sales to get flowers that may not be suitably attractive for bouquets, but that would be more than perfect for decorating the aisle. Alternatively, if roses are among your wedding flowers, purchase a few extra bunches for drying along with the rest of your order.
One of the simplest methods requires only a cookie sheet and an oven. Remove the petals from the buds and lay them out on a cookie sheet. Place the sheet into the oven at a low temperature, and check them occasionally until as much moisture as possible has been removed. Take them out of the oven and store them carefully in something like a sealed baggie, or plastic container until they are needed. Extra scent can be applied to the dried petals by addeing a few drops of an essential flower oil (available at many houseware stores) such as english rose, or jasmine, or lilac.
The oven method, though easy, risks loosing some fragrance by the heating and evaporation of the essential oils present in the petals. Roses can be dried just at room temperature on a screen, out of direct sunlight. Drying times will vary according to the room conditions, and this process is overall much slower than the oven method, but the need to augment the scent of the dried petals will be reduced.
All roses will change color when dried, and will likely not retain a brilliant hue. Bright red tends to fade into a flesh tone, and magenta will end up as a faded pink. The look of a properly dried rose petal is a crispy flake, somewhat resembling breakfast cereal. Allowing moisture to remain isn’t recommended, as the dampness is a fertile breeding ground for mold and fungus.
Keep your dried petals out of direct sunlight to avoid further bleaching of the colors, and make sure you keep them in sealed containers so that the scent is retained long after the drying day. It’s that easy
